Breaking the Rules
by Lucky Charm 911
Summary: Ever since Sarah Josef has refused to get involved with a human. What happens when a human girl from Josef's company is dragged into their world. Josef/OC 1st Moonlight fic R&R rating may be a little strong but better safe than sorry
1. Introduction: Riley

A/N: Okay, so I am hoping that this story will turn out pretty well. This is my first Moonlight fic that I have attempted and I am a little unsure about its future. I have the story mapped out but we shall have to wait and see.

This story is all about Josef, he's my favorite. It's a JosefOC pairing and I am sure that the characters are going to be a little OOC. I write for enjoyment and I am not claiming to be a wonderful author. Take this for what it is, a piece of stress release for the author and nothing more.

Please R&R and let me know what you think of this story so far, I will greatly appreciate anything that I get at this point.

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended.

Chapter 1

The start of yet another day. Well, I guess night is more like it. My days and nights have gotten so turned around during the past year. So much has happened, I can't believe it. But now is not the time to be dwelling on the past. I am late for work, again. Seriously, it was 10 pm and I was supposed to be at work by 10:30. The drive in alone took almost 20 minutes. This is the second time this week. Oh, Mr. Konstantin is going to absolutely kill me. Really, I have no problems at all for the first year that I work there, and now that I have been promoted and have started working in his personal office, I cant seem to do anything right.

I ran around the room slightly panicked. I hadn't gotten back to my apartment until close to 6:30 tonight. Mr. Konstantin was just about to close a huge deal and had us all working around the clock to make sure that something didn't go wrong so close to closing. And of course, as his new personal assistant, I had to be there at all times. I began to throw things into my bag as I quickly found what I hoped was all I would need for the night to come.

I thought that I had everything and therefore ran to the door. I grabbed my keys and cell on the way out. I then proceeded to run down the 7 flights of stairs that separated me from the street level where my car would be waiting for me. As I ran out the door, with 15 minutes left to get to work on time, my phone rang. I looked down at the caller ID. Of course; Adien.

"Hey, Adien, listen I really don't have time to talk. I am running so late. I am supposed to be at work in… 13 minutes now, and Mr. Konstantin already made it clear that today was not a day to walk in late."

"Fine. Listen Riley, we are all getting together for dads birthday on Sunday, at about 10. Mom won't tell me where we are going, but she did ask me to tell you. We all want you there. You think you can get some time off of work to be there?"

"I'll try Adien. Things are really hectic right now, but I will try. Listen, I am driving now so can I call you back later? I really need to make it to work on time today."

"Yeah, whatever, Riley. Call me when you get out of work, ok Sis?" Seriously, can you just see the lack of trust that is there? My own family has to beg me to call them?

"I promise, Adien. I will call you when I get out of work and I will do my best to make it to the party on Sunday, but I really have to hang up now. I will talk to you tomorrow morning." I hung up with a sigh. This family drama is not what I wanted to deal with right now. I turned my attention to the road and to trying to get to work close to on time.

The traffic was tricky but I managed to make it to work only 5 minutes late. I ran to the elevator and hit the button for the top floor. I climbed in quickly and fidgeted all the way to the top. When I stepped out onto the 20th floor of the building I made a quick turn to the left and went to hide in my office for a few minutes. As I hung my coat up and grabbed my shoes to change into I heard the phone on my desk begin to page. Mr. Konstantin.

I took a deep breath and hit the speaker button. "Good morning Mr. Konstantin, what can I do for you?" I was proud of myself. I had managed to keep the nervousness out of my voice, not that he would be fooled. Konstantin always seemed to know what was going on with his staff; actually he was good at reading anyone who he came into contact with.

"Good Morning Riley. I won't reprimand you for being late seeing as nothing of great consequence happened, but this is the last warning that I plan on giving you. You are too competent for me to fire, but I suggest you do not push me any farther than this. I have an appointment with Mr. St John at around 1:00. Call him and ask if he can manage to be here by lets say 12:00. Let me know when you have talked to him."

"Of course, Sir. I will let you know as soon as the appointment is rescheduled." I hung up the phone and took a breath. It didn't seem to matter that he was reprimanding me and threatening my job, he left me breathless in the best way possible. I just have to keep in my mind that he is a pompous ass hole and it just wasn't a good idea. Just focus on what you are supposed to be doing. Call St. John and reschedule there appointment.

I picked up the phone and started in on trying to get a hold of Konstantin's long time friend and sometimes business partner. The day went rather smoothly after the rather disastrous first 10 minutes. I was able to move around all of Mr. Konstantin's appointments to a time frame that better fit his mood and managed to even receive a complement within the first hour of the day. That is, until Mick showed up.

I stood up as Mick walked into the office. I had met this man on numerous occasions when he came in to see Mr. Konstantin. However that didn't seem to matter, I still turned to jelly as soon as he was here. I don't know what it was but there was something about him that just drew people to him, similarly to that of Mr. Konstantin without the arrogance.

"Riley, it is good to see you again. Could you let Josef know that I am here?" He smiled at me and I almost forgot what I was doing.

I snapped out of it and went back to let Mr. Konstantin know that his guest was here. I walked back to the end of the hall and knocked on the door.

"Enter." Of course, nothing but a cold dismissal from him. I shouldn't have expected anything more. I pushed the door open and quietly stepped in.

"Mr. Konstantin, Mr. St John is here for your appointment. Would you like me to send him back?" I kept my eyes locked on his. I had made the mistake of avoiding eye contact early in my career. Mr. Konstantin had taken it as a personal assault and informed me that if I was to continue to work for him I would learn how to stand with a certain amount of respect for myself and those around me. I was then put through 'lessons' as to how to look people in the eye and give a proper hand shake. However, when this event occurred I had only just started to work for the company. I didn't think he would have remembered which is why I was surprised to say the least when he spoke to me again.

"Riley, I am glad to see that you have learned to keep eye contact with people. Now, would you please take your darling self back out into the other room and escort my quest to the conference room?"

Shocked, to say the least that he had remembered what I imagined to be a rather small detail in his life, I turned around and left the room without another word. I walked back down the hall to where Mick was waiting. "Mr. St John? Mr. Konstantin will see you now. If you could follow me to the conference room." He smiled at me as I turned and led him to a room off of the main hall.

After showing Mick to the room, I closed the door and made my way back over to my desk. I took a deep breath as I tried to calm my heart beat. I go a year unnoticed and nothing ever went wrong. I was happy, I made it to work on time, and I never had any problems like this. I get a promotion and suddenly things start to go weird. I didn't think that was how things normally went but I am starting to think I really know nothing of what goes on in the business world and I am pretty sure that I don't really want to know.

The rest of the day passed far too slowly for my taste. I finished the paper work for Mr. Konstantin's meeting later that day. I showed clients around the building. I did everything that was expected of me. And throughout all of this the only thing that I could think of was how much I really wanted to just go home and crawl under my covers.

Twelve hour shifts were really starting to take there toll on me. 10:30 in the morning. I was exhausted and slightly edgy. I had been either sitting at my computer or showing clients around all day. I felt like I would go home and sleep for the next ten hours. I was packing up my things and getting ready to head home when he came up to me once again.

"Riley, you did good work today. Things have been a little out of hand the past few days and I wanted to thank you for doing your job so well. I know that you have only been in this position for about a month but you are probably one of the best PA's I have had in a while." I was surprised to see the look of sincerity on his face. I had been given hidden comments before and sometimes even been told that I did a decent job, but this was the most direct complement that I have ever received from him. "I am having a part for some of the office staff at my house Saturday night. It should start around ten and they normally last all night. I look forward to seeing you there." With that he turned around and walked away.

I stood rooted to the floor for a few minutes. By the time I had snapped out of my trance almost everyone else had left for the day. I slowly made my way back downstairs and out to my car. I needed sleep. I got in my car and ignored the fact that my phone was once again ringing. I turned my phone off and concentrated on the drive home. It had been a weird day.


	2. A Day At The Office

A/N: Ok, I know that these first few chapters are rather short. You are just going to have to work with me on this one. I am trying to get enough in them to make them worth posting but I don't want to over do them at this point. Hopefully they will get longer as time goes on but for now they are probably going to stay a little bit on the short side!

Please R&R and let me know what you think.

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended.

Chapter 2

_I had to get out of here. I didn't know why and I didn't know where I planned on going but I knew that I had to move. I couldn't see anything on either side of me. I felt like I was running down a dark tunnel. All of the sudden I ran into something that was placed directly in front of me. My hands covered the surface, attempting to find a light. I found a cord and pulled. A dim light came from what happened to be a light at the far end of a desk. This wasn't just any desk. This was my desk. I was at work. _

I woke with a start. I had diffidently been spending too much time at the office lately. I was starting to have nightmares. I needed a break. Maybe I would ask for a few days off at the end of next week. That was the only time things looked like they might slow down.

9:00 at night. I had some time to shower and get to work without to much hurry today. I walked to the kitchen in my small apartment. I grabbed a granola bar and sat down at the bar stool that I had near the only window in the small room. The sun had just set a little while age and there was still a light glow in the sky.

It had taken me a while to get used to starting my day when most people were choosing to end theirs. I had never pictured myself working the night shift. I was far too social and loved the sun while I was growing up. I had managed to make the transition rather seamlessly, however.

The first few months that I worked for Mr. Konstantin, I had worked during the day. His company functions almost 24 hours a day, for best productivity I was told. I had been hired as an assistant to his day time assistant. I had done good work and was shocked when I was told that I was being 'promoted' to the night shift.

I had been absolutely outraged when I was first told about the change in position. I was sure that I was being demoted and that soon, I was going to be fired. It took me almost two weeks to realize that in all the time I had worked 'normal' hours I had never once seen Mr. Konstantin. However in the short two weeks since I had been moved to the night shift I had seen him almost every day. I soon accepted the way that the hours were arranged here and fell into place quite comfortably with the night staff.

Alicia had quite almost a month ago. She had been Mr. Konstantin's direct assistant. I took over the position almost instantaneously. I soon realized that I had been slightly spoiled up until now. I had only ever worked as long as 10 hours at a time. Now it wasn't unusual for me to work as much as 15 hour days. I was Mr. Konstantin's link to his day staff and as such I had to be there when everyone arrived.

I checked in with the heads of all departments first thing in the morning and before they were allowed to leave at night. I was also the one that was called if something went wrong during the day. I was the one who had to call and tell Mr. Konstantin the bad news if something went wrong and no one could seem to fix it.

And while it seemed as if it was never ending work, which most days it was, there were perks that I never dreamed of. Almost any time Mr. Konstantin went on a business trip overseas, I was the one to go with him. I also had the luxury of not having to pay for rent or food, as the company gave me an allowance on top of my salary that covered all of those expenses. All of those things were worth missing most of the day time world.

I pulled myself out of my thoughts and took one last glance out of the kitchen window. I threw the wrapper from my breakfast into the trash and walked back to my bathroom. I turned on the water to my shower and let it run hot. I stepped in and closed my eyes as the hot water ran over my tired body, slowly waking up all of the senses under my skin. I slowly washed my hair and shaved. With great effort I turned the water off and wrapped my towel around my body.

I stepped out of the shower and brushed out my dripping wet hair. I brushed my teeth and washed my face before walking back to my room. I looked at the clock, only 9:30. I pulled on a shirt and skirt and then walked back to the bathroom to attempt to tame my uncontrollable hair. Short, thin and frizzy, I swear it was totally and completely hopeless. By the time I was completely ready to go it was 10 o'clock. I would be just on time. I grabbed my purse and walked out the door.

I walked into my office a few minutes early. I walked over to my desk and set my purse down while starting up my computer. I then walked over to the closet and hung up my coat. I walked back over to my desk and slipped my boots off and put on my heals. I then went to get a cup of coffee before getting the day started.

I went back to my desk and began to look through the emails that I had gotten in the past few hours. Nothing really out of the ordinary, a few easy questions and a few quickly dealt with complaints, none of which would take me long to sort out.

I worked for most of the morning on paper work and running errands around the building for Mr. Konstantin. Things were going pretty much right on schedule. We all took our lunch break at about 2:00. Work started up again as soon as we were done. This was how most of my days went. Nothing out of the ordinary, nothing worth causing a fuss over. I had grown so used to things just going as planned and working in the same way they always did.

I had been working for about an hour since I got back from lunch. There was a stack of paper work that had just been delivered to the office that needed Mr. Konstantin's signature before I could send it out in the mail. I organized everything and walked back to his door. I knocked on to the door and heard a muffled response come from inside. _He must really be focused on whatever it is he is doing. _I opened the door and stepped inside.

"Mr. Konstantin, I have papers that I need you to sign so that they can be mailed out first thing tomorrow morning." I looked up to see his response. I stopped dead in my tracks. It looked at first like I had interrupted a rather personal moment between my boss and some unknown women. However when he looked up at me I saw what I tried to convince myself wasn't blood dripping from his mouth.

Mr. Konstantin looked up at me, his eyes locked on mine. I took a few steps backwards and reached behind myself, looking for the door handle. His eyes still held mine, looking intimidating and threatening. I finally found the door handle and yanked it open. I turned around and ran down the hallway as fast as I could. I didn't hear any movement from behind me and hoped against hope that I wasn't being pursued. I reached the end of the hall and ran into the edge of my desk, hitting my leg against the corner. I cursed as I felt the sharp corner scratch my leg. I pushed past it and ran down the hall to the elevator.

I had finally picked up on noises behind me. I thought I could pick out Mr. Konstantin's voice yelling to someone one the phone. I also thought I heard the door at the opposite end of the hall slam shut. I reached the elevator and slammed my hand into the call button. I was too afraid to look behind me and continued to wait for the elevator doors to open.

As the doors opened I realized that there was already someone inside. Mick St. John. I pushed inside the elevator and ran straight into him. He looked down at me in concern and asked me what had happened.

"Mr. Konstantin….. office….. blood…… face." That was all that I could manage to get out. I thought that it was the smart thing to tell Mick about what had happened, he had always seemed like someone safe that anyone could turn to. However, I started to panic as a look of comprehension and relief settled across his face. I became even more worried when I saw a smile spread across his face.

"Riley, lets go back inside and talk about this. I know you are upset about what ever it is that happened but I really think we need to go back inside." He looked up and frowned. The next words out of his mouth were some of the last things I remember. "Josef, what the hell happened." I turned my head only to come face to face with the man I wanted to get away from at that moment, Josef Konstantin.

I do believe that was the point in which I passed out.


	3. Explanation

A/N: I am really happy with how this chapter turned out and hopefully you will like it just as much as I do. This is also my longest chapter so far. Hopefully my chapters will start to get a little longer as I go, but I make no promises. R&R and let me know what you think. I truly value what you, my readers, have to say.

Also I am so happy with the response that I have gotten so far for this story!!! It makes me very, very happy!! I love getting your reviews. I know that it really helps to keep me going and excited about writing when I get such wonderful feedback!!

I am not going to be responding to personal reviews here, for the most part if you leave a signed review, I will reply through the link provided. On with the story!!!

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended.

Chapter 3

I slowly opened my eyes. I was in bed, but I don't remember coming home this morning. I looked around and tried to find my cell, hoping it would remind me of whatever it was that happened a few hours prior. It took me a moment to realize that I wasn't in my bed, in fact I wasn't totally sure where I was. I stood up and walked to the door that was across the room. I opened it and walked into the bathroom. This wasn't mine, wasn't anything that I recognized.

I stopped when I heard the door in the bedroom open. I was starting to panic now. I didn't know what to do and I still couldn't remember anything from last night. All I remembered was going to work yesterday.

"Riley, are you in here. Its almost 8 in the morning. I have some water for you and there is breakfast out in the kitchen if you are hungry." It was a woman's voice, one I didn't recognize. "We really need to talk to you this morning Riley. Can you come out of the bathroom?" She sounded concerned but I still couldn't place the voice. However, seeing as she knew where exactly I was, there wasn't much sense in hiding.

I walked to the door and pushed it open. Waiting for me in the bedroom was the women who had been speaking to me. She looked slightly familiar but I couldn't seem to place her. She was probably 5'6", thin and had long light blonde hair. It was driving me crazy knowing that I couldn't pull her name. "Who are you? Where am I, why don't I remember anything?"

She smiled and took a deep breath. "My name is Beth; I'm Mick St. John's girlfriend. You passed out while you were at work yesterday and Mick didn't know where to take you. You're at our apartment. Mick and I would really like a chance to talk to you now that you're awake. Mick told me that all he could get out of you before you passed out were incoherent mumblings. Do you think you can come out into the other room with us and talk?"

As she spoke everything started to come back to me. _Walking into Mr. Konstantin's_ _office. Feeling pure terror as I saw him lift his mouth, dripping with blood, from the girl's neck. Running down the hall and into the elevator, where Mick was waiting. Begging him to get me out of there. Mick talking to someone behind me. Turning around to see my boss, looking a little more than disheveled, standing in front of me. _I realized that if I had to try to explain all of what I saw to either of them, they would send me to the psych. ward automatically.

"I don't want to talk. All I want is to go home. I am leaving LA. I need to go, please just let me leave." I walked towards the door and tried o push my way out. Beth let me go without trying to stop me. I was half way down the hall when I heard her speak.

"Riley, you're not crazy. Mick and I, we talked to Josef. We know what happened, that is why we want to talk to you and part of the reason why Mick brought you back here." Her words had the desired effect. I stopped dead in my tracks. I was dreaming, that was the only explanation. There was no way that what I was hearing could be real. I was comforting myself in my dreams and I needed to wake up. I kept walking, wanting to get out of here, it didn't matter that I was trapped inside of a dream.

I was almost to the front door when I felt a hand on my wrist. I turned around and gasped when I realized that the hand belonged to Mick. I tried to pull my hand out of his grasp and keep walking. It didn't seem to matter how hard I pulled, however, I didn't get anywhere.

"Riley, we have to talk. I know what you saw and I know that you are probably scared, but we have to talk. Josef wants me to explain things to you. That in itself shows how much he actually cares about you, even if it is just for the work that you do for him. Please, Riley, just come and sit down."

"I am dreaming. That is the only explanation. I am dreaming and I want to wake up. Let me go and maybe if I can get out of this place I will be able to wake up. I just want to wake up." I was starting to panic. Everything felt so real, there were smells and sights that just couldn't exist in the dream world and my façade was starting to crumble. I needed to get out of here. I wanted to be as far away from all of this as I could, but he wouldn't let go.

"I am not letting you go until we have a talk and you understand what has happened. At this point, Josef and I are responsible for you. Until we have talked, you can't go wondering around. It would be best if you just sat down and listened to what we had to say Riley."

Everything around me started to crumble. I sank to the floor at the spot right in front of the door that I had been standing in. I couldn't move, I couldn't think. I was completely panicked. Mick picked me and walked with me over to the couch. He sat down across from me on the small stool and Beth finally came over and sat down next to me on the couch.

"Okay, Riley. I know this is going to be hard for you but I need you to tell me what you saw. I've already talked to Josef, but I need to know what you think you saw. So please, start from the beginning and walk me through everything." I could tell that Mick was trying to be gentle and make me feel comfortable. I could tell that my hands were shaking and I didn't know where to start. I took a deep breath and started from the papers that I had needed Mr. Konstantin to sign.

"I got a stack of papers from one of the lower floors in the office. They were important and needed to be sent out the next morning in the mail. I walked down the hall to Mr. Konstantin's office and knocked on the door. I heard a noise from inside but just figured that he was really trying to concentrate on whatever he was working on. I pushed open the door and told him that I had papers that needed to be looked over and signed." I continued to talk and go over in great detail what happened after that. I recounted everything that I saw, the blood and the girl, up until the elevator doors opened. Mick never took his eyes off of me and the girl, Beth, at some point took my hand and held it for comfort.

"That's all I remember, Mr. St. John. Frankly after I ran into you everything turned blurry. I know that it sounds crazy but I swear that is what I saw. I don't know what it was; all I know is that I want to get out of town. Now." Mick finally closed his eyes and sighed. When he opened them, I expected to see laughter. Instead I saw concern and worry. I didn't know what was worse.

"Thanks, Riley. Listen, I know what I am about to tell you is going to sound crazy but I need you to listen to me, alright? I need to know that what I am going to tell you is never going to leave this room. Can you promise me that?"

"Do you really think anyone would believe me even if I said anything? I am not looking for a reason to be sent to the mental ward. If you have an explanation for what I saw I will listen, but you never have to worry about me talking to anyone about this." I watched as Mick's face visibly relaxed and even some laughter and light heartedness began to show through.

"What you saw was the blending of a world that we try to keep hidden. Josef is a vampire." I saw him pause and watch for my reaction. I tried to keep my face as controlled as possible, although it was nearly impossible. I tried to take in what he had told me but this is one of those situations you never see yourself in. "Riley, I know that this is a lot of information to take in all at once. I know that it seems impossible but its not. There are over three hundred vampires in LA alone. I am one of them."

He paused and let me take in the information that I had been told so far. Josef Konstantin, the man I had been forking for during almost the past year was not human, and either was the man sitting across from me. I then had a realization. Beth was here, being told all of this information. Did that mean that I was the only human in the room? Great, instead of being psychotic, I was now paranoid. Sensing the direction my thoughts Beth turned to me.

"Riley, I am as human as you are. Mick and I met almost two years ago, when I was following up on a story that Mick was also looking into. I didn't know at that time what he was, but much like you, I walked in on Mick feeding. My boyfriend died a year and a half ago and Mick and I started dating about a month after. I have fed Mick on two occasions, but for the most part Mick gets his 'food' from a blood bank. And to take a guess as to what you were thinking, you are probably safer in this room than you are walking down LA streets." She finished and smiled at me. I couldn't help but smile back at her. She had nailed it on the head and had succeeded in calming me some what.

"If you get most of your food from a blood bank, then why was Josef drinking from that girl? Am I really safe with him? What happens to me now? How does someone become a vampire?" The questions started to pour out of me before I could stop them. I was getting myself worked up again and I could feel the hysteria setting in again.

"Riley, I need you to try and stay calm. I promise you won't be in any danger as long as you are with me. I am going to try to answer all of your questions, but I need you to try and keep from getting to worked up, can you do that for me?" I nodded in response and tried to slow my breathing. "Okay. I have more of a moral code than most of my kind. Unless a vampire is rouge, we normally don't kill. Accidents happen but most are able to keep good control over themselves. Josef doesn't have quite as strict a moral code as I do, but he is better than most. He has about 20 girls that rotate through; they all know what he is and volunteer to feed him. He wouldn't feed on someone who wasn't willing. Once you get a chance to talk with Josef, it is almost guaranteed that you will be put under his protection and once that happens no one in our world will be able to get any where near you. Actually, Josef is pretty well known throughout LA, and you should be safe from most any harm."

He paused again to let me take in everything. I think more than anything he wanted assurance that I wasn't going to pass out again. I smiled at both of them. "I am surprisingly, doing okay. It's a lot to take in. But then again, it's the only thing that makes sense. I just have one favor to ask. Can I get something to drink?" Both Beth and Mick laughed at that one. Beth then stood up and disappeared into the kitchen. Mick and I sat in silence. Beth came back with a glass of water and we started up again.

We talked for a good chunk of the day. It was 3:00 in the afternoon when we finally stopped talking. My head felt like it was spinning both from all of the information that I had taken in that day and lack of sleep. Beth showed me back to the room that I had been in when I woke. I lay down and was asleep before my head hit the pillow.


	4. Am I Ready?

A/N: I am not as happy with this chapter as I was with the last one…. I like the first part but I do believe my muse just up and left me for the last part. Hopefully you all like it and will leave me wonderful reviews!!!!

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended

Chapter 4

-Josef's POV-

The past few hours had not gone as planned. What the hell was I going to do about Riley? That damned girl, walking in on me feeding. I should have known better though, than to bring a freshie into the office. I only did it on rare occasions when I couldn't get out of the office and back to my home. There just hadn't been enough time. I had made the decision to cell Alexei and have her come to the office. If only I had brought her in through the main entrance, I could have avoided all of this.

I scared the girl half to death. I could hear her heart beat shoot sky high and I saw the terror in her eyes. I still can't explain why it had taken me so long to respond to her being there. I should have stopped her from running. I got lucky, although I will never admit it. If it hadn't been Mick in that elevator right then I don't even want to think about what would have happened. That opens up a whole other set of issues. The look of astonishment on Mick's face. I rarely screwed up in front of anyone. I had to get this situation under control and soon.

Riley was currently over at Mick's apartment. I had called almost 45 minutes ago and according to Mick she was still out cold. This situation was worse than I had hoped. It would have been one thing if she had reacted to this in a slightly less dramatic fashion. But based on her reaction, it was going to take a while to explain to her what was happening. She was a smart girl, she would get it eventually, but our bigger concern was whether or not she would keep her mouth shut. For that main reason, I had to keep an eye on her. I had to make sure that she felt safe enough to continue to work for me so that I could keep her under supervision and protection.

Almost 95 of my employees were completely clueless to the other world that surrounded them. Bringing my employees into this world tended to put them into harms way and I preferred leaving my business out of that danger. With Riley being in a position this close to me, I should have realize that eventually I would have to either fire her or give her all of the information she was receiving. Most of the time I just fired my assistants, providing them with more than enough money to keep them quiet and happy until they could find another job.

I sat thinking for most of the morning. For once, time passed slowly. Everything seemed to be hanging in a delicate balance. I shouldn't have promoted Riley. I should have left her one step away. If it hadn't been for the promotion, she never would have made it back to my office. Things would have worked out differently. I might… what was I saying. I have no way of knowing that things wouldn't have happened just the same, only with another girl.

None of that was important at this point though. Riley was being let into our world, all because I had been careless. I had to go to Mick's apartment. I had to see how things were going, how she was taking everything. However, the sun had been up for hours already. What I really needed was sleep. I would have to go home and wait to talk with both Mick and Riley until later on in the day.

-Later That Night-

I opened the lid to my freezer and sat up. The days rest had proved good for me. I woke calm and ready to talk to Mick and Riley. It was almost 8 o'clock. The sun was about to set. I walked downstairs and found someone to snack from. After eating I went back upstairs, showered and went back to my room. I pulled out one of my better suits and got dressed.

It was now or never. I walked out to the garage and climbed into my car. Driving over to Mick's seemed to take no time at all. I sat outside for a few minutes trying to prepare myself. I was being ridiculous and I was well aware of it. I got out of the car and let myself into Mick's building. I rode the elevator up to the top floor and got out. Mick was inside, but it seemed like he was still asleep. I could also sense two humans, one asleep and one awake. I walked over and knocked on the door. I was slightly relieved when I saw that it was Beth who was opening the door. She smiled at me and invited me in.

"Josef, Mick and I were expecting you. Sit down and I will go see if Mick is awake yet. Help yourself to a drink." With that she smiled and walked up the stairs. I walked over to the kitchen and pulled out one of Mick's blood bags. I poured some into a drink and sat back down in the living room just as Beth and Mick came back down stairs. Mick looked over at me and laughed slightly. He walked into the kitchen and came back out a few seconds later with a drink for both himself and Beth. The two sat down across from me in the couch.

"So, how did she take the news? Is this going to turn into some huge drama or might we actually be able to get back to work?" I was anxious and slightly irritated at myself by this point. I needed to know the extent of the damage. Mick looked over at me and smiled.

"Relax, Josef. She was rather anxious at first. However, she let me get everything out and was able to keep herself under control for most of it. She is pretty shaken up at this point. But I think it is going to work out. You need to listen to me though, Josef. Riley is going to need some time. She has to be able to process everything and that could take a while. She has to feel comfortable with you again. If she isn't comfortable she isn't going to want to go back to work. What I am telling you is that when you see her again, tread very carefully, be gentle with her and keep your temper in check. You think you can handle that?" I almost laughed. Mick seemed to have so little faith in me at this point.

"I got it, Mick. I have been in similar situations before this and I know how to deal with this. I don't know how much time we have, though. There was a big deal that we were supposed to close next week in Paris. I need her ready to travel by that point." I actually did laugh that time. The look on Mick's face was priceless. I swear it was as if he didn't know me at all. "I think it's your turn to relax, Mick. She won't be traveling with me any time soon. You really think I am that much of a bastard?" Mick froze suddenly.

"Josef, she's awake. I am going to go and get her and then Beth and I will leave you two to talk. We will be upstairs if you need us.

-Riley's POV-

I woke up and looked at the clock. 9:30. Had it really only been just 24 hours since this nightmare of a day had started? I sat up and thought back to everything that I had been through. Talking with Mick and Beth had been interesting, to say the very least. I walked over to where a suitcase of my things had been set. I pulled out a sweatshirt and pulled it over my head. It was at that moment that there was a knock at my door.

"Morning. We thought you might be hungry. Get some food in your stomach. Once you're done, Josef is here. The two of you should probably talk." I watched Beth throughout all of this. She really expected me to be able to talk with Josef now? I closed my eyes for a moment to collect my thoughts.

"Beth, are you sure? I don't know if I should talk to him quite yet. I am still trying to take all of this is. I still don't know how to react to all of this. Is there any way that we can put this off?" She smiled and looked slightly concerned.

"Riley, I know that this is a lot of information. But I can promise you that the longer you put off talking to him, the harder it will be. You are completely safe. Mick and I will be just upstairs and will most likely be able to hear everything that happens. You already know that I trust Mick with my life. Well, Josef is the only other person I would turn to if I was in trouble. If he wanted to hurt you, he would have already done it. If he really had wanted to hurt you, you wouldn't have made it out of his office this morning." I wasn't totally sure whether or not what she had just said comforted me or not. "Eat your breakfast and then go talk to him. I am going upstairs with Mick. We'll both come down when you two have had a chance to listen to each other."

With that Beth stood up and walked out of the room. I went over and started to pick at the bagel that she brought me. I knew that I had to do this. I ate in silence thinking about what I would soon have to do. No matter how much I tried to fight it, I knew that I was going to have to face him.

I had been assured over and over again that he didn't pose a threat to me, but I couldn't quite accept that. I knew I was being hypocritical. I already trusted Mick not to hurt me. I had no problems believing what he told me and accepting Mick for what he was. But Mr. Konstantin, Josef, was just so different. I couldn't explain it. Especially after thinking back to all of the time I had spent working with him. He had never harmed me in any way. I had never felt like I was in danger from him before. But now, after I had seen what I had, I didn't know what to think.

Before I was ready, I had finished my bagel. I took a few more sips of water and then walked to the door. I stood with my hand on the door knob for what seemed like forever. With a deep breath, I finally opened the door and walked out into the hall. I walked down to the living room and stopped when I saw him standing on the other side of the room, looking out the window. He shocked me when he spun around to face me. Our eyes locked and I again felt the fear and anxiety from his office. He must have realized what had happened because he let my eyes go and moved to sit down in one of the chairs.

I walked over and tentatively sat down across from him in the couch. Neither of us knew what to say, so we sat in silence for a few minutes. Mr. Konstantin's eyes never left my face; I kept my eyes focused on the floor.

"Riley, I know that a lot happened yesterday. I know that you are probably a little overwhelmed and that you are probably more than a little scared and confused. I can here your heart beat. I have been able to since you walked into the room. I heard it jump when you looked at me. The fact that you are afraid to be in the same room with me, for that I am sorry. I am sorry that you had to be brought into this world at all. Almost none of my employees know that we exist. I would have rather left you in the dark than have to feel the fear coming from you." I smiled slightly to myself. He was just as awkward in this situation as I was. Further more, I knew that Josef Konstantin rarely apologized. "I just have one question to ask you. Are you so afraid of me that you won't work for me any more? I need to know how all of this information is going to affect both you and my company."

I truly smiled for the first time since I woke this morning. Of course, he was always worried about the bottom line. The truth was however, that I didn't know what I planned to do. I had to be honest with him.

"Mr. Konstantin, I…"

"Please, considering all of the circumstances, call me Josef."

"Ok. Josef. I don't know where I stand right now. As much as I would like to deny it, being around you does frighten me. But, if I have your word that I will never be in danger from you, then I can try to make it work. It may take me a while to be as comfortable at work as I was, but I am willing to try." As I spoke, I watched as a slow grin appeared on Josef's face. I wasn't sure whether or not that was a good sign.

"Of course. Riley, you have my word that for as long as you work for me and put yourself in my presence, you will be under my protection. No harm will come to you from me or from any one else, especially within my world." I could hear the sincerity in his voice. I had to believe that he really meant me no harm. I guess that answered all questions.

I then heard footsteps on the stairs. I turned around to see Mick and Beth walking towards us. Mick left to get all of us a drink. Beth came and sat down next to me and Mick walked back in and sat down in the chair next to Josef. Josef and Mick talked about a case that Mick was working while Beth and I chatted about what had been in the news recently. I finished my drink and was ready to leave. I excused myself and started to walk back towards my bedroom.

"Riley, take the next few days off. Make sure that you are really ready to come back before you walk back into the office. We can make do without you until you are ready."

"Thank you, Josef. But I will see you tomorrow. I don't want time off right now." I knew that I had to get back before I talked myself out of it. I then looked over to Mick. "Thank you for letting me stay here. I am going to shower and then I should get back to my apartment. I really appreciate all that you have done for me." With that I turned and walked back to the spare bedroom. I turned on the water in the shower and stepped in. I really needed a chance to think about everything that had happened.


	5. Time Off?

A/N: Okay, so this is the last post that I have completely written and edited so this is going to be the last thing you guys are going to get before next weekend most likely. I will try very hard but I doubt anything will be posted before Thursday. Very sorry, but school is a little crazy this semester! Also, I know that this chapter is ridiculously short, but I needed a little bit of filler in between the last chapter and the one where she goes back to work. R&R!!!

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended

Chapter 5

I woke up, on time, and got ready to go. After my shower, breakfast, and whatever else it was that I did to get ready, it was only 9:30. I still had an hour until I had to be at work. After all that had happened over the past 36 hours, I probably should be listening to everyone else and taking some time off. I didn't want time off though. I wanted to go back to work. I couldn't just sit here, with all of this free time, and not think, and at this point, that was what I was trying to do. I didn't want to have to think about what I had seen and what I had learned.

The longer I sat, the more clearly I could hear the conversations that had happened over the past day. I didn't want to have to relive all of those conversations; they had been weird enough the first time. I looked at the clock again. I would be about 30 minutes early if I left now, but at least when I got to work I would have something to keep my mind busy. That was it, I had to go into work. I know that Josef didn't want me there, but maybe I could make him see that I shouldn't be at home.

I got to work around 10. I was pretty proud of myself; I didn't feel anxious or nervous at all. Maybe coming back to work was a good thing. I walked into the office and turned my computer on. After I had my desk set up I walked back to Josef's office. I knocked on the door and waited for a response.

"Come on in, Riley. I have sort of been waiting for you to show up." I smiled a little, he knew me better than I thought. I pushed the door open and walked into the office.

I froze almost as soon as I walked into the door. I walked into the room and the panic set in almost instantly. I saw him standing before me and as hard as I tried, I couldn't force the image of him feeding out of my head. I hadn't expected the fear and anxiety to hit me so suddenly. Josef picked up on what had happened as soon as the door opened. He took a step away from me and then walked back to his phone and called someone to come and get me. About five minutes later, the door opened and Mick walked in. He came over to me and put his arm around me.

As Mick ushered me out the door, I took one last glance back at Josef. I seemed to be okay now that I was with someone else. As I looked at him, I thought I saw a glimpse of pain and sadness in his eyes, but as soon as I took another look, it was gone. Mick pulled me out of the door and drove me back to my apartment.

I stayed there for the next few days. I didn't take any phone calls and the only people that I let come over were Mick and Beth. Beth had stayed with me the first night to make sure that I was ok. After that, the both of them had come over every day for the past five days. Mick told me yesterday that Josef had asked about me a few times, wanting to make sure that I was ok.

After five days of doing absolutely nothing, I started going out again. Beth and I went shopping for a few hours one day. I even called my brother, Adien, and went out to dinner with him. The next few days after that were ok. I went over to Beth and Mick's for dinner one night for dinner. As I was getting ready to leave, Josef stopped by. I had been able to day hello, goodbye, and walk past him without the overwhelming fear taking over me at this point. I caught his eye as I slipped past him and again thought I caught a glimpse of regret in his eyes. But just like the last time, it was gone when I looked back.

I went back to work the next night.


	6. Short Lived Return

A/N: ok so I was able to get this up much earlier than I thought!! What can I say; the reviews and seeing how many hits I have gotten on this story inspired me!! Enjoy the chapter!

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended

Chapter 6

Ten days had passed since I had talked with Mick, Beth and Josef; I went back to work yesterday. I could tell that Josef was a little upset that I had come back so quickly. He had asked me to take a few weeks off. I had a feeling that I was going to be just as 'unwelcome' today as I was yesterday. Oh well, he was just going to have to deal with it. I grabbed my jacket and sun glasses and walked out of my building. I jumped into my car and sped off to work.

I parked my car and walked into the lobby of the corporation. I smiled as I passed the security guards, secretaries and everyone else that was running around. I couldn't help but wonder if any of these people knew what was really going on, how many of these people knew what Josef was. How many of the people in this building were like Josef and Mick? It was something that I would have to talk with Josef about at some point.

I walked into the waiting elevator, the only one that went all the way up to the top floor. I punched in my code to the elevator security system and rode in silence up to my office. The doors opened and I walked into the dark office. I passed our secretary, Marie, as I walked back into my office. I took care of my jacket and started getting my computer and desk ready for the day.

As I was in the middle of this the phone rang. Frankly I had expected this the moment I walked into the room. "This is Riley." I smiled to myself waiting for what I new was coming.

"Riley, it's Josef. Please come back into my office." With that he hung up. I knew that as soon as I walked back there, I was going to get yet another lecture about how I should be taking the week easy. I should be at home relaxing. I had heard all of this yesterday and I really didn't want to have to listen to it once again. I was ready to be back, ready to get to work. That damn man was far too stubborn. I picked up a few stacks of papers that had to be signed in order to make it out in the mail tomorrow and walked back to his office.

I knocked on the door and then let myself in without waiting for a response, like always. I walked over to his desk and started to set out the different forms that had to be looked over. "Mr. Konstantin, I was hoping that you could look over these papers and sign them so that they can make it out in the main on time." He sighed and looked slightly frustrated.

"Riley, I have already told you to call me Josef, so that is what I expect you to call me from now on. Also, we talked about this yesterday. I don't want you here. You need to take some more time. I appreciate you being so dedicated, but I need you to take some time to yourself. You have gone through a lot. I need to know that mentally you are completely ready for whatever I may need you to do in the next few weeks. The only way that I can be sure you are ready to be back here, that you aren't afraid to be back here, is if I know you have taken time to deal with these fears."

"Listen Josef, I know that you are worried. I have heard it from you more than enough times. I have gotten phone calls from both Mick and Beth, checking up on me. I need to just be left alone. I want to get back to my work. I want to get back on a schedule. I am asking you to back off a little bit. Let me do what I know I need to do right now. Can you do that for me?"

"I don't know. I don't want you to push yourself too hard to fast. I also don't want you here if you are afraid. You are no good to me if you are scared to be in the same room with me. And frankly that is what I think you are trying to do right now. I can feel you when you are on this floor with me. We have already talked about this; I can hear your heart beat increase in fear."

"Then isn't that my problem. You are supposed to be running a business here. Just because I may fear you doesn't mean that I shouldn't continue to do my job."

"I guess I will let you do what you want. I can tell your not going to give this up. I am telling you right now though, if I think you are under to much pressure, I will start to back off on your work load. I can make you take a break even if you choose to come in to the office."

I was frustrated to say the least. I stood there while he signed the papers that I had brought in with me. I then walked back out to my desk and closed my eyes. I could not believe that he was doing this to me, because I wanted to get more work done. Unbelievable.

I tried to stay focused on my work for the rest of the day. I was starting to see my work getting pulled out from under me. All of the non urgent questions were being directed to Josef's AM assistant. And of course nothing seemed to be really that urgent any more. Josef also started directing his scheduling issues to Marie. By lunch time, I had relatively little left to do. I tried to stay calm and reasonable about all of this but I could feel my blood boiling under the surface.

When I got back from my lunch break, I went to start on the list of phone calls I had to make, only to find that they had already been handled. That was the last straw. I couldn't take any more of this. I stood up and walked back to Josef's office. I pushed the door open without knocking and again found Josef catching his lunch. He was able to compose himself much quicker this time and sent the girl to his side room.

"Josef, we need to talk." I tried to keep my pulse and breathing under control. He might have been able to compose himself this time but I was again threatening to lose it.

"Riley, you really need to knock. I want to be able to protect you, but I can't do that if you refuse to knock. There is no reason why you should have to see that, especially when you are still scared of what I am."

"Shouldn't it be my choice as to what I can and cannot handle? And going off of that idea, what the hell are you doing Josef? Just because you think I need to take some time off, your passing off all of my work to people who won't get it done as completely as I do. Are you really willing to put your pride in the way of getting the best work out of your employees as possible?"

"I already told you that this was going to happen, Riley."

"You are unbelievable. Let me do my job. You can't play me like this. I accepted your protection, but if this is how you view protection, then I don't want it. When I am in real danger, that is one thing, but this is abusing your power."

"Fine, I am abusing my power. You're still getting paid. You would be getting paid even if you were at home. So take your time coming back to the office and then I will give you all of your work back."

"You really think that the only reason I am here is because of the money. I enjoy working here, or at least I did."

"If you don't want the money and you don't enjoy it any more then why are you still here? Listen, if you really want to leave, I will pay you well enough to keep your lifestyle up until you find another job. I will even pay you to keep your mouth shut about what you have learned. Just remember that I can get someone else to take your job, someone who will be grateful, in less than five hours." Jesus Christ, how had this gotten so blown out of proportion? All I wanted was my work back, I didn't want to leave. But now it seemed as if he didn't want me here. Had I really been missing this all along? I didn't know, but I couldn't stick around to find out. I should have known that this was going to be a problem. Both of us have egos and pride that would never work well together.

"You know what, I get it now. I was stupid not to see it before. If you didn't want me to be here any more, then all you had to do was to give me my pension and tell me to clean off my desk. I would have been gone long before now." With that I turned around and walked back to my desk. I threw all of my personal belongings into a bag and left.

I made it back down to the lobby and walked out of the building. When I was outside, I took one look back at my old office window. While fighting back tears, I walked to the parking garage and got into my car. When the door was finally closed the tears started to come. My life has gotten so totally screwed up. Two weeks ago, I came to work, I did my job, and I went home. I went on dates when I had the time, I had a social life. Now, I had been welcomed into this new world. I had no job, I didn't know if I could continue with a social life. I would always be looking over my shoulder, wondering if the person walking next to me was human. Mick had made it clear that there were many of their kind that wouldn't have a problem with feeding off of humans.

Josef had offered me his protection as long as I worked for him. Now that I had quit, where did that leave me? If others found out that I knew about them, would I really be in danger. How valuable was the protection that I had just thrown back in his face? I didn't know what to do at this point. I started to drive with no idea as to where I should go.

I eventually found myself at Buzz Wire. I needed to talk to someone and I felt that Beth was someone that I could trust. I walked into the news office and was immediately thrown into the news room. I looked around for Beth, not really sure where she would be. I jumped a little as I heard a voice behind me.

"Riley, what are you dong here?" I turned around to look the speaker in the face. Exactly the person I was looking for.

"I was actually going to ask Beth how to get a hold of you, Mick. I really need to talk." He looked at me and I could see the concern in his eyes.

"Ok, let me go say goodbye to Beth really quickly and we will go back to my apartment." He walked over to a desk and knelt down to talk to the person that was hidden from view, presumably Beth. He stood up again and walked back over to me. He put his hand on my back and led me out of the crazy news environment. We both got into our respective cars and I followed him back to his apartment building. We walked upstairs and Mick went to get us drinks as I sat down on the couch.

"So, I see you took Josef's advice and are actually taking a few weeks off. That's good, take it slow." I sighed. I should have known that I was just going to run into more support for Josef, no matter who I talked to.

"That isn't why I came Mick. I went in to work today, Josef and I fought about the amount of work I was doing. He thought I was taking on to much and started to pull all of my work out from under me. I went into his office and started yelling. I quit. I don't know what to do any more. While we were talking I got way to defensive and everything he said started to feel like he was trying to fire me, without really doing it. It seemed like he wanted to get rid of me, but it had to be my idea, ya know? I know that I probably over reacted, but it's done now. I really don't know what to do. I don't know where to go. I feel like I can't go home, because Josef is paying for it and I feel like I don't know who to turn to any more, because I cant even tell who is and isn't human. I don't know if I can deal with all of this."

"Listen, Riley, go back to your apartment. Get a drink and try to calm down a little bit. I will go in and talk to Josef. If you really want to be at work, then I will see what I can do. Even if you quit, Josef will most likely take you back. We will figure something out, I promise. Just go home and get some rest right now and I will call you when we have figured everything out. And as for who you can and cannot trust, Beth and I are both here for you. If you ever need anything you call one of us." I took a deep breath. I had made such a mess of things at work. Mick was really the only person that could talk any sense into Josef at this point. And he was right, no matter what he was I felt safe with him. I knew that I could call both him and Beth if I need to.

I said goodbye to Mick and drove back home. I let myself into my apartment and walked back into the bedroom. I slipped out of my work clothes and pulled on my pajamas. I walked back out to the kitchen to get a glass of water.

As I was standing there, I thought I heard someone knock on the front door. I walked over and started to walk down the hall.

With no warning I was grabbed from behind and felt a cloth placed over my nose and mouth. The glass that I had just gotten from the kitchen slipped from my hand. I heard it shatter on the edge of the wood floors. I started to struggle but eventually my eyes closed and I felt myself fall into unconscious.

-Mick's POV-

I had just finished talking with Josef. I had managed to get him to back off and try to work things out with Riley. I pulled my phone out to let her know what had happened. It rang and rang and rang before eventually dumping into voice mail. _Oh well. I will try her again later. Maybe she is actually taking things easy, getting some sleep. I'll try later._ I hung up without leaving a message and started back to Buzz Wire to pick Beth up.

A/N: I know I know evil cliff hangers. I will try to get the next update up soon, but I make no guarantees. But the process will probably go a little faster if I get wonderful fun reviews.


	7. Missing

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended

Chapter 7

-Beth's POV-

"Mick calm down. She probably just turned her phone off. If she was as shook up as your say she was, that's not overly surprising." I tried to hold back a smile. Mick was already blaming himself for something happening, all because he couldn't get a hold of Riley as soon as he would have liked. Always playing the hero.

"Beth you don't understand. She was anxious, but she wanted a solution to this. She was so shaken at the thought of not being able to live her life the way she had, she needed to fix this. I got the impression that she was going to be waiting by the phone for me to call her. This just doesn't add, none of it does." He was so upset. I didn't know what to tell him to even begin to help him. He got up again and started to pace the length of the living room. I swear, he was going to wear the carpet down so thin that there would be hardly anything left.

I walked over and put my hand on his arm, stopping the nervous movement. He turned around and wrapped his arms around me. I returned the hug with as much force as I could manage.

"Listen, Mick, you have cases that you have to work on. You can't just ignore your work because of this. How about I go over to her apartment and tell her what you and Josef worked out. I'll talk to her. I promise everything will be okay. I will call you once I talk to her ok?" I looked up at Mick and finally got a smile out of him.

"Fine, but be careful Beth. I already don't have a good feeling about this and you going over there isn't going to help matters. Just be careful, alright?" I smiled and nodded my head. I stood up on my tip toes and gave him a small kiss. I then walked over to the door and grabbed my purse and car keys.

I drove over to the complex that Riley lived at. They were nice apartments, small, obviously only for one person, but nice. I took the elevator up to her floor and walked down the hall until I found 704C. I knocked on the door and waited for a response. When one didn't come I knocked again and yelled into the apartment, still no answer. Okay, maybe Mick was right, this is a little odd. I tried the door and was surprised to find it unlocked. I let myself in and walked into the main living room.

"Riley, are you here? It Beth, Mick and I were starting to get worried about you." I walked to the back of the apartment towards where I assumed the bedroom was. I knocked again on the door and then pushed it open. "Riley, where are you?" I looked into the bathroom and when I still didn't find anything, I walked back out to the kitchen. She wasn't anywhere to be found. I took out my phone and called Mick as I made my way back to the main entry hall. Right as Mick picked up the phone I stepped into a pile of glass and wet carpet.

"Shit, ow. Mick, are you there?" Great, that was probably the stupidest thing I could have done; now he is going to be worried.

"Beth, what's wrong, what happened?"

"I just stepped on a pile of glass. Mick, she isn't here. I looked through the entire apartment and she isn't here. I have to go get my foot cleaned up; you should probably come over and have a look around."

"Okay, Beth. I will be there in a few minutes, just hold tight." With that the phone in my hand went dead. I locked the front door and then walked back to the bathroom to clean up my foot. _That will really teach me to where these sandals again. _I sat down on the edge of the bath and started to pull some of the bigger pieces of glass out of my foot. I heard a knock on the door and then Mick was standing next to me in the bathroom.

"Let me get the rest of those out for you." He sat in front of me and was able to get all of the glass shards out of my foot. He then wrapped it and handed me a pair of tennis shoes that he must have remembered to grab before he left the apartment. I smiled up at him in thank you.

"Mick, what do you think happened to her? I mean there really are only a few possibilities. Either she ran away, she was taken, or there was some sort of emergency."

"I don't think she ran away. She wouldn't have asked for my help if she was still planning on leaving LA and I don't think there was an emergency. She was kidnapped; I can feel another vampire's presence in the room. Whoever it was came in and was able to take her with very little struggle. Nothing other than the glass, which she was probably holding, seems out of place. In all honesty, Beth, I don't really know where to start with this one. I highly doubt that anyone knew that she knew about us, but the attacker was not human. Nothing is really making sense."

-Josef's POV-

Damnit, Mick was supposed to call me almost an hour ago. He left so quickly after we talked about Riley that I didn't even get a real explanation. Damn idiot just comes in here, tells me that there was a miscommunication with Riley, then tells me that he is getting her to take a few days off, but that she didn't really quit. Why I told him I would consider letting her come back I can't imagine. While yes, she was good at her job, she was stubborn and was proving to be much more trouble than she was worth. So why the hell couldn't I just have told Mick that she wasn't welcome back here?

That was it. I am going home; Mick can try to get a hold of me later. All I wanted to do was to lie down in my freezer and fall asleep. This week had been absolute hell. I picked up a few folders that I would have to look over at home before I slept and made my way to the door. I was just about to lock the door when my office phone started to ring. Damn timing. I walked back in, set my things down and picked up the phone.

"This had better be really damn important." I was not in the mood to deal with clients or sales pitches today.

"Josef, its Mick. Sorry it has taken so long to get back to you. Listen, you need to come over to Riley's apartment now. Beth and I are here. Riley has gone missing. Hurry up and get over here man." As much as I didn't want to admit it, I was rather upset by this news, not because she was causing more trouble for me, but I was surprised to realize that I was actually worried about the girl.

"Do you know anything yet? Wait, don't tell me yet, I will be over as soon as I can, fill me in when I get there." I hung up the phone and walked back out of my office. I walked over to the elevator and quickly went down the secure parking garage that I had put in under the building. Some called it paranoia; I just looked at it as precaution. I slid into the car and sped out of the underground structure and on to the main LA roads.

It took me a little over 10 minutes to get to Riley's apartment. I raced up the stairs and stepped into her apartment. I found Beth and Mick fairly easily in the kitchen. "Mick, what the hell happened here?"

"We couldn't get a hold of her on her cell phone. Beth came over to talk to her and when she got here the apartment was empty. We think she was kidnapped. There are traces of another vampire being here and there is a broken glass in the entry hall. That's all we know right now, man. It looks like it is going to be a hard trail to follow." I couldn't accept that this was all we could do. Technically, this girl still worked for me and I had given her my word that I would protect her.

"I am going home, Mick. I am going to start calling some people to see what we can do. We have to keep this out of the news, Beth. I don't want the police getting mixed up in this. They don't need to be involved in this. Either of you call me if you get anything new." With that I turned and went back to my car and drove home.

One of the few rules I had for my life, don't get attached to humans. As much as I tried to deny the fact, I was attached. I needed to find this girl. I walked in and sat down at my desk. I closed my eyes and tried to get control of myself.

Sitting in front of me on my own desk was a note, one single piece of paper. On the paper it clearly laid out the terms that I would have to follow in order to get Riley back. She wanted 5 million in cash all in small bills. Probably the worst part about all of this is that the attacker, Charlie, was once one of my PA's. I had fired her about 20 years ago. Apparently she had tracked someone down to change her and was now trying to come after me. I don't think I could ever forgive myself if something happened to another innocent girl because I didn't deal with Charlie soon enough.

Charlie had figured out what I was. She didn't know how many others there were in the area, but she did enough to be a danger to me. I paid her well to keep her mouth shut. I had thought that it was finished. About two months after I let her go, a young boy turned up dead. Charlie had ended up working for the DA's office and knew details of the murder. A vampire had been involved, and knowing what she did, Charlie had been able to put the pieces together and figured it out. She had thought that I was the one who killed the boy. She came after me and almost exposed who I was. I threatened her with worse than death if she did.

She disappeared after that. I had Mick keep tabs on her for a while, but it soon became unnecessary. About a month after I pulled back security on her, almost 2 years after I fired her, she came back into my life. I had just fired the PA that had replaced her. The poor girl went missing about two days after I let her go and I received a ransom note later that night. We spent a week chasing after her but in the end Charlie ended up killing her. I couldn't find her after that and after a few years I forgot about it.

I knew that I should have killed her after she threatened to expose me for what I was. It really was too dangerous to let her live even after our history, but I decided not to act. It was because of me that one of my personal assistants had been killed. I refused to let it happen to another innocent girl, especially if that girl was Riley.

I scanned a copy of the letter and wrote out a note to Mick before I emailed it all to him. He would know exactly what this meant and how urgent it was to find a trail before it was too late.

-Riley's POV-

When I woke up I was incredibly uncomfortable. The last thing I remembered was having a cloth pressed up against my face and slowing blacking out. I guess that would explain why I was currently sitting on what had to be the stiffest chair I had ever sat in. I slowly picked my head up and opened my eyes. There wasn't much light in the room but the little that was there seemed to be too bright. I tried to bring my hand up to my face but found that I was unable to move. Where ever I was, my hands and feet had been tied to the chair. I tried to speak, but my throat was to dry to make a coherent sound.

Suddenly the door across the room flew open and the overhead lights were turned on. I felt a hand clamp down on my throat and the only thing I could hear was the laugh of the women standing over me.

A/N: So we have found out who took Riley. And Josef has started to let his feelings for Riley peek through! Now if only he could admit to them!

Press the wonderful little purple button at the bottom of the page, leave me a nice little review, and make your author very, very happy!


	8. Charlie and Looking For Signs

A/N: Ok I am going to apologize in advance because I am not very happy with this chapter. I really did not want to write it. Hopefully it isn't too bad. And I am also sorry that it took so long for me to get this up and I am sure that most of you are ready to start feeding me to the wolves but I just need to make it through the next week and things should start to get a little better. I go on spring break in a week so I should have quite a bit more time to put to my writing!!! Review and let me know what you think and I will try to have another chapter up soon.

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended

Chapter 8

The hand clamped down over my windpipe and threatened to snap my neck. I tried to keep myself from panicking. All of the sudden the hand lifted both me and the chair that I was attached to off of the ground and threw me across the room. I crashed into the wall and the chair beneath me broke into splinters, freeing both my arms and legs. Unfortunately, I think I also broke a bone, which basically made it impossible for me to think about standing up or escaping. Damn my luck.

"Ms. Riley Michaels, it's a pleasure to finally meet you. We have a mutual friend, I do believe. I will go get you some food, and then we will have a chance to talk." With that she walked out of the room. I was thrown back into darkness. My body hurt all over and I wanted nothing more than to go back to sleep.

I was able to pull my hand up to my face to cover my eyes before my kidnapper came back into the room. I was able to block out most of the light but that didn't seem to really matter. She walked over to me and picked me up once again. However, this time I was set down, somewhat carefully what I assumed was a bed. I felt like I was going to throw up but I forced myself to open my eyes and look at whoever it was holding me hostage.

She was staring down at me, an evil smile plastered onto her face. I closed my eyes again and tried to block everything out. I wanted to sleep.

"Riley, there is food on the table. Until you decided to eat, I should probably fill you in on why you are here. I am sure it won't be a surprise to you to hear that this has something to do with Josef, what he is. I am sure that you know what he is, you don't seem too afraid of me and that leads me to believe that he has let you into our world. I actually haven't been a vampire very long even shorter time than Mick, as a matter of fact. I was reborn almost 15 years ago. I didn't necessarily want to become what I am, but I needed my revenge. Josef ruined my life, caused me to live in fear for almost two years, until I decided to fight back."

"What makes you think that Josef will even come looking for me. What makes you think he cares one bit about what happens to me?" As much as I hated myself for saying the words, I couldn't help but try to guess at the truth behind them. Was anyone going to do anything about my disappearance? Mick had promised me that he would always look out for me, but would Josef get in the way. How angry had I really made him?

"Why do I think he will come looking for you? This is almost too easy. You would be the second girl he has lost to me and Josef can't have that. Not only would his morals not allow that, but the police would eventually discover that he is the mysterious link between you, the other office girl, and of course me. I almost made the last one too easy for him. He nearly caught me before I could kill the other poor girl, what was her name, Carrie Ann. She was a sweet girl, too innocent though. She really thought that all I wanted was the money I had asked Josef for. She didn't understand, as I hope you do, that she was dead from the minute I took her."

She paused for what I could only assume was dramatic effect. As scared as I was, she was right about the fact that I understood what was happening. I was as good as dead. I didn't want to give up so quickly, but really who was I kidding. I had walked out on Josef and all that he offered. I could tell by the look that he gave me that he was beyond angry.

"You're as good as dead, as I am sure you have realized. You still have about a week left. It should take him at least that long to track us down. Until then, we are going to be spending a lot of time together. We should get to know one another. Eat, I have to run a quick errand and then we shall take all of the time we need. Oh, by the way, my name is Charlie." With that she stood and walked out of the door.

I walked over to the table where she had left my food. The assortment of breakfast foods was overwhelming. Laid out in careful order were French toast, eggs, oatmeal, sausage, pancakes, bacon, and toast of at least three varieties. I may be a prisoner, but I was apparently going to be eating damn well. I sat down and started to pick as a few of the things in front of me. I didn't know what I could do at this point. There wasn't much of a way that I could make myself sick enough to go to the hospital, I couldn't out run her or fight her and there was no way that calling for help was going to be of any use. I really did appear to be at a dead end, facing a no doubt slow and rather painful death. I guess I would just have to wait, wait and see if any possible chance appeared. That was my only choice.

-Josef's POV-

It had been six hours since I had found the ransom note. Mick had dropped Beth off at Buzz Wire and then met me at Riley's apartment to start looking for any sign of where she might be. We had gone through anything left out at the apartment. We then went through Mick's old notes of Charlie. Nothing had turned up yet. Beth was doing what she could to track down any information on Charlie from before she had been turned but still nothing of great significance had turned up.

I picked up the file that I had been reading over once again and began to look through its pages. I could not accept the fact that I had once again managed to let my employees down. I had to find her, and soon. I knew that I would have about a week, if the last girl was anything to go on. She had been killed 6 days and 20 hours after she had gone missing.

We weren't getting anywhere. This was one of the few times I could remember throughout my long life actually feeling helpless. I stood up and told Mick that I was going for a walk. He offered to come with me, but I knew that I needed some time to myself. I made my way to my car and quickly found myself on the main road. I parked not far from a small park that I sometimes come to.

Even during the middle of the day there were hardly any people in sight. I walked for almost an hour until I found myself back at my car. The cool air had been diverting and I had been able to clear my head. I drove back to my office, planning on Picking up a few things and then heading back over to Mick's.

I had picked up all that I needed when I noticed another note sitting on the corner of my desk. I took a breath and picked up the letter.

Josef – You know what all of this is about. You know what is going to happen to the girl if you don't find me in time. I promise that she is being well taken care of for now. She should be enjoying a rather large breakfast as you read this. I have missed you and our game. I can assure you that it will get interesting before we are finished. By the way, you're looking in all of the wrong places.

Best of Luck

Charlie

I grabbed the other things I had come for and got back to Mick's as fast as I could. I threw the other papers down onto the table when I walked in and handed him the letter.

He scanned over its contents quickly and looked at me. We both sat down and sighed. This was going to be one hell of a long night.

A/N: Ok once again I am not thrilled with this chapter. I didn't want to write this and I think it showed in the way it turned out. I ask all of you to just bear with me for another 10 days and hopefully I will be able to put up a few better quality chapters. I do have to tell you though that unless I can get another chapter out tomorrow, you will probably not see me for the rest of the week. I will do the best I can to make up this short chapter and long wait to you all but you have to give me just a little bit more time!!! Review and let me know what you think of this chapter!


	9. Getting Desperate

A/N: Ok so I know that I have been horrible with the updates and what not. The last chapter was plagued with a rather persistent writers block and as soon as I was able to get rid of that I had to deal with the fact that I really think my teachers are trying to kill me with all of the homework that they have loaded on. I am on spring break now and so hopefully I will be able to get one or two chapters up during the next week. I will do my best to have at least 2 more chapters up in the next week but I make no promises. Please leave a review and let me know what you think of the chapter and I will post again as soon as I possibly can.

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended

Chapter 9

It has already been two days. I was starting to question how much longer I could hold on in Charlie's game. Yesterday all we did was sit and talk. She told me what had happened to her and why she was so bent on looking for revenge. It had all seemed normal at first. I could tell that she was upset, but everything that she was saying just seemed to me like the ranting and ravings of a scorned teenager. I had hoped for a while that that was really the depth of her anger.

Unfortunately for me, she soon moved on to darker and more dangerous topics. She told me what had happened exactly to the other girl, Carrie Ann. Why she had taken her, and what she did to her before she killed her. The physical and mental abuse that that poor girl had been forced to go through was awful. I started to realize that this is what was waiting for me.

It was this morning that the beatings began. When Charlie walked into the room I could almost feel the hatred and anger pouring out of her. She picked me up off of the bed and threw me across the room into the opposite wall. My already broken leg was joined by a newly broken arm. I needed to get out of here and get to a hospital before all of these set. But of course, I really shouldn't be worrying about all of this now. She picked me up again by the throat and threw me again, head first into the wall. I closed my eyes trying to block this entire thing out. I put myself back at Mick's apartment, someplace that I knew I would be safe at. I pictured myself here until the beating stopped almost five minutes later. As she walked out of the room, I heard her call back to be to be waiting for the next one.

I tried to pull myself over to the bed. I made it about half way across the floor before I blacked out.

-Mick's POV-

We had searched every possible lead that we could think of, all in two days. This wasn't a good sign. Josef was actually starting to look panicked. That in itself was worrying me. Through her contacts at Buzz Wire, Beth had been able to pull up a credit history and we had been able to track most of her purchases. There was only one left, but it didn't look promising and we hadn't wanted to check it out until everything else had run dry. She had made a payment on something about two weeks ago. It was the oldest purchase on the card. Only problem was she had blocked what all of her purchases were so we had no idea as to what this could be.

Josef and I were going to check it out today; we were leaving in just under an hour. I was a little worried about leaving Beth behind, but if we did find Charlie I just couldn't have her there. I was actually a little unsure if I wanted Josef there either. He was too personally involved in this case and I could already see it was having way too much of an effect on him. I continued to pack my bag and think about what we might be getting ourselves into.

After a few minutes I heard a light knock on my door. I walked down the stairs and looked out of my security camera to make sure that it was Josef. I pulled open the door and took a step back as he walked into the apartment and began to pace. I watched him for a few minutes and eventually let out the laugh that had been trying to escape sense he had gotten here.

"What the hell are you laughing at, Mick?" I again let out a short bark of a laugh.

"Nothing, Josef. You're just…. Well never mind."

"Mick, I am really not in the mood to deal with your odd sense of humor."

"You're really worried about her aren't you, Josef?" I watched his face as he took in what I had said and tried to find a way to argue the point. "We will find her, Josef. I promise you, we will find her." I could have sworn that for a split second I saw a smile on his face. However, when I looked back at Josef, his face was blank once again.

I walked over to the hidden storage in my sink and pulled out a bag of blood. I poured both Josef and myself a glass and we sat down to wait for time to pass. We sat in silence as we drank. When we had both finished our glasses we still had about an hour until we had to be at the air port. I made my way back up to my room and gathered the rest of my things. I walked back down stairs and set my things at the door. I once again sat down across from Josef and we waited.

It was nice to just be able to sit. Josef was one of the very few people that I was completely comfortable with and would never need to worry about filling a silence. I thought a lot about what we were getting our selves into. Josef made himself an easy target by surrounding himself with so many beautiful human women. Charlie knew that and knew which women were the most important to Josef. It was so rare that Josef let any one that he worked with into our life that he normally didn't have to worry about the girls that worked for him being in too much danger. Riley seemed to be special though. Whether or not he would admit it, I could tell that he was developing feelings for her. Whether or not it was more than just concern at this point, well I wouldn't know the answer to that until Josef decided to tell me himself.

The time had come for us to make our way to LAX. We were flying to a small town just outside of Huston. That was where Charlie's first purchase had been made and Riley's life depended on us finding something there. The cab ride to LAX was relatively quiet. Josef was lost in his own thoughts and I knew better than to try and pull him out at this point. Instead I let my thoughts drift to Beth for the duration of the car ride.

-Josef's POV-

Mick and I walked down the front stairs of him apartment building and quickly made our way to the car that was waiting to take us to the air port. We climbed into the car and settled in for the half hour ride. Mick attempted to start a little conversation at the beginning of the ride but I shut him out. I couldn't just sit here and talk about what might happen anymore. I couldn't believe that I had let Riley get into this kind of danger. I could still remember her first day working for me. She didn't know I was in the office and still doesn't know that I was there for a majority of the time while she worked the day shift.

I wasn't even supposed to be there on her first day. There had been a meeting that had run long and I was leaving the office almost two hours later than normal. I was making my way down to the third floor to get some things taken care of on my way out. I remember stopping outside of the door and listening to her heart beat. I didn't know who it was at that time, but whoever it was, their heart was racing. She was obviously nervous. I waited until I could tell that the poor girl was down the hall and out of eye sight before I opened the door. No reason to give the girl a heart attack on her first day here. I walked into the office and caught out her direct boss, interested as to who we had hired.

When I started talking with my day light assistant, she told me that Riley had been hired on as her assistant and was getting the tour of the office at that moment. The phone rang and the girl excused herself and went to answer it. I walked back farther into that set of offices. It was then that I saw her. She was beautiful, to say the very least. She reminded me of the girls that were often found in my home, the bleeders. The thought crossed my mind of inviting her to become temporary staff at my house for that sole purpose.

I dismissed the thought after barely a moments thought. She was certainly beautiful and I knew I wouldn't be able to ignore that. She wasn't tall, but not to short either, standing at close to 5'6". She was almost model thin and couldn't have weighed more than 125 pounds. She had dark brown hair that ran in soft waves to just below her shoulder. I could tell just by watching her interact with the other staff for a few minutes that she was stubborn but still had a good sense of humor. She would be fun to tease once she worked her way up in the company a little.

I am slightly ashamed to admit, even if it is just to myself, that I watched her for the next few hours. Actually I watched her at least twice a week for a few hours after I had supposedly gone home for the day for the next few months. I guess some would describe that as having stalkerish tendencies. I preferred to describe it as curiosity.

I smiled at the memory of that time. I pulled myself out of my memories as the car pulled up to the air port. Even to this day, I don't know quite what it is that did and still does draw me to her. She intrigued me for that very reason. These memories, ones that Mick has no clue about, are the reason I am so intent on finding her. I couldn't bear the thought that she had to die because of what I was. I couldn't allow it to happen, not to her. I had to know the full extent of her seemingly strong hold on me. When, if, we ever get her back, I owe her an apology. It was because of what I was that she was in so much danger, it was because of the fact that we had yelled at each other and I had let her walk out that she was in this danger. We would find her, we had to.

The plain ride had been long and rather frustrating. It gave me way to much time to sit and think about things that I had no control over. I wanted nothing more than to be able to find her, yet I was stuck, not able to do anything in that damned plain. Mick and I were currently driving to the address we had received from Charlie's credit bill. I guess I was more nervous than I would admit. I didn't know how to deal with this. I was attached and I knew how dangerous that could be. I knew how dangerous it was. I was going back and forth as to how I was going to deal with everything and we didn't even have a proper lead in finding her yet. I was getting to be more than a little pathetic. I was loosing control of myself and that was something that I could not allow to happen. The car pulled up outside of a rather impressive looking apartment building. I sighed as I tried to get control over myself before we went to deal with this.

"I don't know how long we will be so wait for us here." After addressing the driver both Mick and I stepped out of the car. I walked around the car and we both walked towards the building.

"Mick, what do you really expect to find here? Do you really think that Charlie wouldn't cover her tracks?" I couldn't help but be a little skeptical. We walked through the front door and went up to the front desk.

"Excuse me, I am looking for a Ms. Charlie Bennett, you wouldn't happen to know how I could reach her do you?" The man looked up at me, more than a little startled.

"Um, I am sorry sir. What is your business with Ms. Bennett?"

I smiled down at the poor man. "I am her brother. Alexander Bennett. Now do you think you could tell me, is Charlie here?"

"My apologies, Mr. Bennett. She is in apartment 3C, I do not know if she is in or not. You are welcome to go up to her room and see." I looked over and smiled at Mick. We turned away from the desk and walked back towards the elevators. We stepped into the elevator and Mick turned to me.

"That was impressive, Josef. Now, let's just hope that this lock of hers is one that I can pick." He flashed me a joking smile. It was nice that the tension between Mick and I had finally seemed to drain. He wasn't pressing for information from me and I could relax.

We stepped out of the elevator at the third floor and made out way to the apartment that the man had given us. Mick knelt down and had the lock open in less than a minute. As we were about to open the door, I felt Mick's hand on my arm.

"Josef, there is someone in there waiting for us, vampire, I can't tell if it's her or not. Unfortunately I can only find one person inside. Riley isn't here." We pushed the door open carefully and walked into the living room.

There was a man standing with his back to us. _Not Charlie_. He turned to face us as we both entered the room. We were surprised when he greeted us with a smile. We were even further surprised when we were both addressed by name.

"Josef, Mick, please come and sit. I do believe that we have a lot to talk about." He smiled and took a seat in the chair closest to him. His eyes followed mine and I could tell that he was old, older than both Mick and I combined. I moved to take a seat and felt Mick follow behind me. "I know that you are here for Charlie. I also know why you are here for Charlie. I will not help you find her. It was a waste of your time to come here. You won't find anything that will lead you to her or your sweet little office girl. I have to say, she is a beauty. If it weren't for the fact that Charlie is going to kill her, well she would be a wonderful addition to my personal collection of women. Absolutely beautiful."

It took all of my self control to keep my self in check. I knew that if this turned into a fight there was no way, even 2 to 1 that Mick and I could win. "And if I may be so bold, who the hell are you?" I knew I was probably going to regret this, but frankly I just wanted answers and I didn't really care who I pissed off to get them. Mick threw a look over to me, telling me what I already knew. If I got us into even more trouble than we already were, he was going to pretty much decapitate me with his own hands.

The older vampire smiled back up at us. Surprisingly, he didn't seem to be angry and he even let out a short laugh. Even more surprisingly were the words that came out of his moth next. "My name is Mario. I am Charlie's sire." I glanced over and caught Mick's eye.

Well, we were relatively screwed.


	10. Starting to Break

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended

Chapter 10

-Josef's POV-

Ok so maybe I had over reacted when I stated that Mick and I were pretty much screwed. We were now back in LA and still all in one piece. We left Texas almost 18 hours ago and were now trying to sort out our next move. Our talk with Mario had been interesting to say the very least and we had a guess as to what Charlie's next move might be. For the first time in the past three days I was starting to feel like things might be working out.

Mario told us why Charlie had come to him to change her and why he had agreed. As it turns out, Charlie had been almost dead when she had finally found Mario. She had found out that, like many in her family, she had cancer. Doctor after doctor had told her that there wasn't anything that could be done about it. She knew that she was running out of time and probably wouldn't have made it through the week if she hadn't found Mario. According to Mario, she had begged and pleaded with him to change her after she had found out what he was. He finally gave in when she mentioned her revenge. Mario had been in a situation similar to hers when he had been changed and felt for her.

After the change, Charlie quickly become much more powerful than Mario had ever dreamed of. Similarly to me, she was a true vampire, through and through. She disappeared about 6 months after she had been turned. Mario hadn't been able to track her down until almost 3 years ago.

While he refused to help us outright, Mario had given us the names of a few people that might be willing to help us track her down. Mick and I had spent the last few hours finding these people and getting what information we could. I had just spoken with the last of my leads and come up with nothing. I hoped that Mick had had better luck than I did. There were only four more days to track her down if we had any hope of bringing Riley back in any way other than a body bag.

I knew that Mick had said he would call either when he found something or when he had run out of leads, but I was to the point where I didn't know how much longer my patience was going to be able to hold out. I needed to know that we had a lead of some sort. I refused to admit that we had once again landed ourselves back at square one with no idea as to where to go. I got up and once again began to pace. That in itself was not a good sign. I should have better control over myself than this. I needed to get control if I was going to be of any help in finding her. I knew that I couldn't allow myself to get carried away but there had to be something that I could do in the mean time.

That's it. I couldn't take it any longer. I was going to go over to Mick's apartment and wait there for a response; maybe I could help him track someone or something down. I grabbed my phone and my keys and walked to the door. Just as I was about to leave, my house phone rang. I turned and almost ran back over to the phone.

"Mick, is that you?"

"Relax, Josef. I have worked through all of the leads and I think we might have found something. I called someone who worked with her a few months ago. They said that they were helping Charlie to set up two different apartments, one just outside of Miami and the other in New Orleans. One of these could be the place that we are looking for. If this is it, we might be able to find Riley before any real harm comes to her." I couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief.

"That's good. I will pack a bag and I should be over in less than an hour. Call and book a flight for us to New Orleans, we can start there and then head to Miami. Thanks Mick." I hung up and ran upstairs to pack a bag. When I had finished with that, I walked a little bit more slowly to my kitchen and grabbed a pint of blood. It had been to long since I had fed. I was pushing myself too far in that area since Riley had gone missing. I finished off the bag I had opened and then proceeded to drink two more. No reason to be careless when we were so close to maybe finding her.

I couldn't help but think of Riley. She was beautiful and strong. I hoped to god that she still had that same spirit when we found her. Last time, Charlie sent me a picture five days after she had kidnapped my assistant. Even before she had been turned, Charlie had been able to destroy the poor girl. The picture that I had received showed how broken she had become. I held on to the knowledge that Riley was one of the strongest willed human girls I had ever met. I knew that she would be able to hold on longer than most. However all of those thoughts resonated out of the picture I had received when Charlie was still human. Now that she had been turned, I didn't know what to expect.

I took a deep breath and pushed all of that aside. I couldn't dwell on the mental picture that I was getting of Riley as just a shell. I had to get to Mick's so that I wasn't just sitting around any longer with free time on my hands. I grabbed my suit case and walked out of my house to my car. These past few days had been more than a little exhausting. I was running on pure adrenaline at this point but I didn't need anything else as I drove over to Mick's apartment once again. I didn't even have to get out of the car this time. Mick and Beth came walking out of the front door, both carrying bags.

"Beth, are you coming with us this time?" My question was directed just as much to Mick as it was to Beth.

"I tried to talk her out of it but she pretty much insisted on coming along." I could hear the strain in Mick's voice as he answered my unspoken question. It was clear to any one within a 100 mile radius that Mick would have preferred Beth stay behind and out of danger. Beth laughed as Mick responded, I am sure she could also sense the effort it took for Mick not to lock her up in one of his spare bed rooms.

"If either of you really thought I was going to just sit on my ass here while you two were off playing hero, you are both bigger idiots than I thought. Besides, I am just as anxious to find Riley as either of you are." With that Mick climbed into the front seat and Beth slide into the back. I was pulling out of the driveway probably no more than a second after Mick pulled the door shut.

We pulled up in front of the air port and quickly made our way to our gate in less than 20 minutes. I was not looking forward to yet another plane ride, but there was nothing else I could do. We boarded the plane and eventually took off for our five hours of waiting. I spent most of the time throwing myself into my work in order to keep my mind off of what was happening, yeah right. I should have known that something would come up and spoil it for me.

I had just pulled up a news cast from one of the local LA stations only to find that I was the main topic of discussion. I reached over and taped Mick on the shoulder.

"Mick, I do believe that we are in for a little trouble." I was beyond upset at this point. This was exactly what I had wanted to avoid. Mick leaned over and I turned the volume up just enough so that we could both hear.

"We have just received word that a Ms. Riley Michaels, personal assistant to Mr. Josef Konstantin, was reported missing earlier this morning. Michaels was reported missing early this morning by her brother, Mr. Adian Michaels. Michaels called the police after many phone calls had gone unanswered by his sister. Police have not released any official suspects as of yet, but rumored to be on the list is Mr. Konstantin. This case is all too similar to another almost 20 years ago, also involving one of Mr. Konstantin's personal assistants." At that point I had heard enough. I sat back in my seat and sighed. I looked over at Mick and saw that he was in a similar position to myself, head tilted slightly back and eyes closed.

"What the hell am I supposed to do now Mick?" I tried to keep the panic out of my voice, but if police did announce that I was one of their prime suspects, I wasn't going to be able to run for long. I expected the calls to have started already. I was sure that my voice mail at the office was completely full already.

"There isn't much that we can do until we land and find out if you are a suspect. If you are officially under investigation, you will probably be flown back to LA. If you aren't, then we just make sure that you ant be found. This means that you can't access you bank accounts, you can't use your credit cards, and you can't turn your cell phone on. It also may come down to you having to stay hidden in the hotel room for a portion of our visit."

"Listen, you know damn well that I will do everything on that list except return to LA and stay shut up in a hotel room, no matter how nice it is. We have to find her and I plan on being a large part of that. If I get arrested I need you to bail me out and I also need you to come up with an alibi for me. Seeing as you were on the phone with me when she disappeared, or at least during part of that time frame, I can't be a suspect. I have the ransom letters as well so that should do something. Thank god you're a PI other wise we would be really screwed." I could tell Mick was trying not to laugh at the end of my rant.

"Josef, relax, your not going to jail, and I wont let you get sent back to LA. We will figure a way to get you out of this until we find Charlie and Riley." Mick then faced the front again and I could tell that he was trying to clear his mind. I lay my head back against the seat but I couldn't still my mind. I couldn't help but run through the many situations that could be awaiting us when we landed.

After what now seemed like too short a time, the plane started its decent. The plane pulled up to the gate and we grabbed our bags out of the overhead compartments. We walked off of the plane and I was relieved to see that no one seemed to be waiting for us. I glanced over and Mick and he gave me the briefest of nods. We quietly walked down to where our car was waiting to take us to the hotel.

When we got to the hotel, Mick and Beth went into their room and tried to get settled. Unable to do anything to keep my mind calm at this point, I began to pace. About five minutes into my pacing, there was a knock at the door. I walked over and took a deep breath to calm myself down. My anxiety was almost through the roof as I pulled open the door. I was able to breath a sigh of relieve as a hotel employee stood before me.

"Excuse me; I am looking for a Mr. Konstantin. I have a letter for him."

"I am Josef Konstantin." I stated simply. He nodded and handed me the letter. I thanked him and he walked away as I shut the door. I pulled the envelop open and scanned the letter quickly.

Josef –

I am sure that you have been waiting to here from me. I knew that you would eventually track me to New Orleans. Before you get to anxious, Riley is still alive. You still have a few days to finish tracking us before I kill her. I wish you could see her. She is truly a strong girl. As I am sure you have guessed I am working to break her. You will be glad to know that I haven't quite gotten to that point yet.

Look at the picture I sent with this, you should still be able to make out some of her personality.

Three more days to this game. I would normally wish someone good luck in this, but I would be lying to both of us if I said I wanted to you succeed. I guess I shall see you at the finish line.

Charlie

I reached into the envelop once again and pulled out the picture. It was Riley, but not how I had last seen her. Her leg look odd, probably broken. Her shoulder also looked like it had been pulled out of its socket. Her face was cut, bruised, and bloody. Worst of all was looking into her eyes. I could tell that some of the old spark and fight was still there, but I could also see that she was starting to give up. Part of her didn't think that there was any hope left and she was starting to let her body shut down. Mick walked through the door and looked at me. I looked away as one lonely tear slid down my cheek.

A/N: Ok hope everyone likes this chapter!!! I really like how it turned out. Leave a review and let me know what you all think. I love getting your feedback so please take the time to leave a review. I am going to try and get another chapter up before I start school again, but I make no guarantees.


	11. Rescuing Riley

A/N: Hey everybody, YAY! I actually got up two chapters this week! Hopefully you all like this and will leave me wonderful reviews!

On a side note, I have gotten a few reviews and messages asking me if I had any favorite Josef stories and I have one author that I really like who has 2 completed and 1 in progress story where Josef is the main character. The authors name is rentemotion so you should all check out her stories, they are wonderful!

That is it, so on with the story!!!!

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended

Chapter 11

I slid in and out of consciousness for most of the day now. We were going on day five and things were not looking any better. Every time Charlie came into the room at this point was a nightmare. She would come in, set a tray of food down on the table, and then proceed to kick the shit out of me, covering my body in more bruises than should be possible and breaking more and more or my body and spirit. I didn't know how much longer I could hold on. I didn't know how long she planned to keep me alive, but I almost wanted her to kill me at this point so that the pain would stop. She had taken a picture of me the other day after she finished beating me. I hoped that my family would never see that picture; I never wanted them to see me like I had become.

As I sat there and waited, I heard a static grow louder and louder in the corner of the room. Voices slowly started to play from the speaker I assumed was hidden in the shadows. As the voices grew louder, I began to recognize one of them. I choked back a sob as I heard Adian plead with the police dispatcher, trying to find some lead as to where I had gone. I was forced to listen to the same ten minute tape over and over again for close to three hours. After the first half hour I broke down and began to sob openly. After another hour, my body had run dry of all tears and the dry sobs had stopped. I had finally begun to tune out the desperate voice of my younger brother when a new voice echoed through the room. This was not a voice that I recognized, but instead the voice of a reporter. If I had had any tears left to cry, they would have begun to spill once again as I heard the reporter announce that the LAPD had issued a warrant for Josef Konstantin, who was the main suspect in my disappearance.

After almost five hours of listening to the two recordings, I could feel everything within me shutting down. This was the last straw; I knew that I couldn't fight back any longer. Charlie had set out both to destroy Josef's life, but also to destroy me. She just won.

And when I thought this day couldn't get any worse, the door opened and Charlie walked in. She began to drag me out of the room. We made it to the door before I blacked out.

-Josef's POV-

We had been waiting since we had arrived at the hotel. Beth, Mick and I had all read over that god damned letter countless times. I knew that there would probably be one last letter to tell us where we should attempt to save Riley. Charlie would send us the body location with just enough time that if we were extremely lucky, we would get to in order to save Riley just minutes before she would be killed. I had a private jet waiting a small private air port. As soon as the LAPD had announced that I was the only suspect in the disappearing we had decided that we couldn't even take the risk of leaving the room until we had to. We were lucky that we had used Beth's name in making the arrangements to come here.

We sat for close to seven hours. I didn't want to admit it, but I was hungry. I had a fairly good feeling that Mick was also starting to get the munchies. If we didn't get out of here soon and to the jet, we would all be in trouble. Time seemed to tick by as slow as ever. I didn't know what I was going to do if we had to wait this out for another night. I was starting to wonder if we were ever going to get that final clue when Mick stood up.

"Josef, both of us need to eat and the only way we are going to do that is if we get on to that plane. Let's just go now, and we can wait there. It shouldn't be to much longer until we get something and as frightening as it is, Charlie seems to know exactly how to find us." I sighed and thought about it for a minute. As much as I hated to admit it, he was right. We both needed food and we all needed to get out of this room. Beth called down to the car that was supposed to be waiting for us. Mick and I quietly made our way out the back entrance of the hotel while Beth went to the desk to check out. She soon joined us in the car and we made our way unknown to the public to the private jet that stood waiting for us.

We took about 20 minutes to settle into the plane and for all of us to take some time to eat. We all gathered back in the main area of the plane to once again wait. We had been on the plane for all of an hour when Beth's phone rang. I ignored the sound and went back to waiting for some sort of letter to be delivered while Beth was on her phone.

I was pulled out of my thoughts when Beth walked back over to where we were sitting. "Josef that was Charlie. She got my cell phone number from Buzz Wire. She told me that we needed to start flying now if we wanted to make it to Miami in time to save Riley." I sat completely stunned. Mick slipped out to tell the pilot to take off immediately. "I asked for proof that she was still alive and all I got was laughter." Mick walked up behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist. I was still in shock. Beth broke down in Mick's arms.

The pilot came on over the speaker and told us to buckle up and prepare for take off. We sat down and the plane took off almost instantaneously. We were in a race against the clock. We had to get to Miami and soon. We still didn't know where in Miami to go, but the best starting place would be her apartment. The clock was ticking and I couldn't help but fear that I was once again going to be too late.

We landed in Miami and there was a car waiting to take us to the address that we had. We climbed into the car. I wasn't sure what to expect at this point. I hoped that we would make it in time to save her. This was only the very beginning of the sixth day; we should still have close to 20 hours to find her and keep all of this from happening. Charlie was changing the rules of her game. We were stopped at a light when Beth's phone began to buzz. Mick and I locked eyes and then turned our complete attention to Beth. She flicked open her phone and scanned through the message.

"It's from Charlie. Josef, she wants you to bring the ransom with you. She says that she will kill Riley in front of all of us unless you have the 5 million cash that she requested. In addition to that, she wants a flight to be ready for her, so that she can get out of the country as soon as she has her money."

"Josef, there is only one way that you can really do this and Charlie knows it." I looked to Mick as he spoke the words that we both were dreading. "The only way for us to get all of this arranged and set would let Riley die. When we save Riley, Charlie will almost certainly be able to escape."

I let the words sink in. I didn't have a single idea as to what I should do from here. I knew that I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I let Riley die. I knew that no matter the cost I would save her. I also knew that in order to do that, I would have to let Charlie leave. I would have to swallow every last bit of personal pride and just let her walk onto an aircraft and let her fly away after what she did to me, after what she continues to do to Riley. The need for revenge was deep, but I knew that this once, I might just have to let it go.

10 Hours Later

The car that we had rented picked us up at the airport for the second time today. Mick and I had just finished making the arrangements for the plane that was to take Charlie out of the country. Beth had spent the afternoon in the hotel and we were now all together, riding to Riley's fate. I had the ransom in three different cases that were all sitting next to me in the car. It had taken almost 4 hours to pull everything together on that end. Taking out that much money in such small bills had not been easy. I only prayed that Riley would still be safe when we got to the house.

The driver pulled the car to a stop and then told us that we had arrived at the address he had been given. The sun had just started to set as we stepped out of the car. Mick and I both got out and then Beth climbed out behind both of us. I could feel the fear and nervousness pouring off of both Beth and Mick, Beth afraid of what we would find and Mick afraid for Beth's life.

There was probably a time frame of 15 minutes until Riley would be dead; we had to start moving quickly. All three of us walked up to the magnificent house. Mick picked the lock and we let ourselves in. We had no sooner made it to the front parlor than we were greeted by the owner of the house.

"I am glad that you were able to find me alright, Josef." Sickened humor dripped from Charlie's every word as she addressed me. "Your girl is still alive, for the moment. Do you have the money and the jet waiting for me?"

"We had a deal, did we not? Your money is in the car outside. That same car will drive you to the airport, where there is a private jet waiting to take you where ever it is you choose to run to this time. Where is Riley?" Charlie smiled once again at us and snapped her fingers. Two men walked out to the car to find the money.

"I will show you to her in just a moment." Her henchmen walked in and assured her that all of the money was there. "Very well, Josef, she is down the hall last door on the right." She smirked at us as she walked out of the house and slid into the car.

"Mick, Beth, the two of you should wait outside. Call a car to come and get us and take us back to the airport. We have to get her back to LA as soon as possible." Beth slipped outside and was already on her phone. Mick stayed behind and watched me. I knew he wanted to help me through this, but there was nothing any one could do. "Mick, this is something that I have to do by myself. Please, just wait outside with Beth for us to come out." Finally, Mick nodded and walked out of the house. I practically ran back to the door at the end of the hall. I took a deep breath and opened the door.

As soon as the door was pushed open I heard multiple explosions from all around the house. I took a quick look around and soon saw that the house was on fire. I moved into the room and shut the door. One look at Riley and I could feel my heart, one that so many assumed was made of nothing but ice, melt. Riley was slumped into the corner of the room. I could tell that she had multiple breaks and that she was bleeding internally. I walked over to her and carefully touched her bruised and bloodied face. She pulled away from the touch instinctively.

I could hear Mick and Beth yelling outside. I could smell the fire and feel the heat closing in around me. I had come this far, only to die when I finally saved her. I picked her up in my arms and walked over to the door. I opened it and looked out into the inferno that the house had become. I saw one possible escape. There was a small section of house that had not been touched by the flames as of yet and I knew that that was my only chance of getting both her and myself out of here alive. I took a deep breath and ran at the window.

As my body impacted with the glass, I sheltered Riley as best I could, trying to keep her from any more physical harm. I felt some of the glass slice into my back and arms. I would have to have Mick take care of those. I slowed to a walk as soon as we had made it through the door. I moved away from the flames of the house and lay Riley down across the street in the neighbor's yard. My full attention was on Riley at this moment. I heard Mick and Beth walk up behind me. I felt Mick pull the shards of glass out of my skin. I heard my phone ring and heard Mick answer is. I stayed like this, solely focused on Riley until I heard the paramedics pull up behind us.

I took a step back and let the men take care of Riley as best they could. Mick gave them a statement for all of us and told them that we would be at the hospital soon to give the police our full accounts of what had happened. I turned to Mick and smiled, grateful that he was taking care of everything. Beth walked over to me and put her hand on my arm and smiled. I turned toward her and pulled her into a light hug. We had made it out alive but Charlie was still gone. I swear it was like Mick could read my thoughts.

"Josef that was the pilot on the phone. He said that Charlie had told him to fly to Germany. Do you want me to make the call?" I smiled at him. The plan had actually worked.

"No, this is one call that I have to make." I smiled at Mick and dilled a number into my phone. It rang and I waited for someone to pick up. "Cohen, she is on her way to Germany. I expect that you will deal with her when she gets off of her flight. Good." With that I hung up. I looked over to Mick and gave him another smile. Riley would be safe and Charlie would be dealt with. Now I just had to feed and get the warrant for my arrest to disappear before I could go and see how she was doing. For the first time in six days, I was able to relax.

A/N: Well I hope you all liked this!!!! Leave a review and let me know what you think! I will try to have the next chapter up sometime next week.


	12. Time in the Hospital

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended

Chapter 12

I woke up in a hospital listening to all of the machines around me beep. My whole body hurt. I wanted nothing more than to fall back asleep. I picked my head up and was able to look over myself. My right arm and left leg were both in casts. My other arm was covered in bruises. It hurt like hell to breath. I had no idea what time it was, or what day it was, or even where I was at this point. The last thing I remember was being locked into a small room and listening to Charlie yelling. I tried one more time to look around the room. There was nothing familiar at all. I had no idea what I should do at this point.

It was then that I looked at the chair next to my bed. I have to say that I was rather surprised at what or rather who I saw there. I watched him for a few minutes, and as I was starting to lie my head back down he opened his eyes. He looked over at me and smiled. I was so glad to see him, glad to know that someone was here with me.

"Riley, it is so good to see you finally awake. Your brother just left a few hours ago. Your whole family has been very worried about you. They were so glad to have you back home and know that you were going to be alright." Mick smiled at me and spoke softly. I was grateful; I could already feel my head start to hurt. "I should go and get the doctors, let them know that you are awake." I nodded and he walked out of the room.

Mick walked back in a few minutes later followed by a doctor and three nurses. They came, drew all sorts of blood, poked around, and asked me some questions. I swear I was exhausted by the time they were done. They finally left and I closed my eyes. I heard Mick laugh a little in the back ground. There was one thing I still needed to know, but I was just so damn tired.

"Mick…" It was taking a lot out of me to talk at this point. "Mick, has …he been …here …at all?" I really didn't know whether I really wanted the answer or not. I felt like I had put him through so much trouble, but I wanted to talk to him so badly.

"Yeah, Riley, he has been here almost every minute of every hour. I sent him home last night; he hadn't slept in a few days. You have been out of it for a while. You were at the hospital in Miami for two days until they figured you were stable enough to be moved. You have been back in LA for the past three days. Your body went through a lot of stress. Josef has had the best doctors available working to get you better. I will probably call him tonight, and let him know that you woke up. I can pretty much guarantee that he will be here tomorrow morning when you wake up." I couldn't help but smile. I was happy that he had been here and I was slightly cheered by the thought of him being here tomorrow. Mick looked at me and smiled. "Go to sleep, Riley. I will stay for a little while, but you need to get some sleep." I nodded, grateful that I didn't have to vocalize my want to have someone I trusted close by. I fell back into a dreamless sleep relatively easily.

I woke up the next morning and was still sore as hell. It took me a while to open my eyes and look around. The blinds were pulled and there was very little sunlight coming into my room. I reached over and grabbed the remote to my bed. I slowly raised myself into a seated position. Just as I was finishing the one person I had been waiting to see for I guess almost two weeks now was waiting in the door way for me. He looked at me and I smiled. He smiled back at me but it didn't quite reach his eyes. He walked over and sat down in the chair that Mick had been occupying the night before. He looked back up at me and we sat there. I don't know how long it took for someone to say something or to look away. We both needed the sight of the other person, to convince ourselves that all of this was real.

"I don't…" I began.

"Riley, I …" Josef started at the same time. I smiled and looked back at him.

"You go first." I laughed a little, I was nervous. I could tell that he was nervous as well.

"Riley, I am so sorry. I don't know how I can ever make all of this up to you. I am truly sorry." I could tell that he had more that he wanted to say, but wouldn't. Josef had already let his guard down around me more than I had ever hoped he would. I knew now he had started to regain his control, I wouldn't get much more out of him.

"I am so grateful to you, for everything. I should be the one making this up to you, not the other way around." As I spoke, he looked at me, his astonishment written clear on his face.

"Riley, you have nothing to apologize for." I could tell he was uncomfortable. Neither of us really knew what to say to the other person. I didn't know how to act around him; hell, I didn't know how to react around anyone at this point. "Well, I should probably go. Now that you are awake, I am sure that you will have other visitors that you would much rather be with. Either Mick or I will be around for a while, though. We aren't going to leave you alone right now. Neither of us wants to take the risk of you getting hurt again." I nodded and he left.

The rest of the day passed in a blur. I fell asleep for a while after Josef left. Adian and my parents were here for most of the day. My family left around seven that night and it was now almost nine. I hadn't seen anything from Mick or Josef all day. I was nervous without one of them close by. I realized that I didn't like being alone for any length of time. There was a knock on the door and when I looked up, Beth was standing there. I felt a wave of relief flood through me. If Beth was here, Mick couldn't be that far away.

"It's good to see you awake again, girl. How are you feeling?" I was glad Beth was here. She had such an easy air around her. True, I didn't know her well, but I was comfortable with her, I always had been.

"I guess I'm alright. Everything seems so weird right now. Even more than before, I don't know who I can and cannot trust. I don't know where to go from here. Every time a new doctor or nurse comes in, I am so sure that something awful is going to happen again. My family was here for the day, and I didn't know how to talk to them. They asked me what happened and I felt like I couldn't tell them anything. Josef was here earlier, but I didn't know how to talk to him anymore. The whole situation felt so forced. I just feel so alone, so isolated." By that point, I was practically sobbing. I hadn't meant to unload all of this on to Beth, but I just couldn't hold it in any more. I was terrified all the time. I didn't know how I was going to face going home when they finally let me out of the hospital. I just didn't know what I was doing anymore. Beth came over and sat next to me on the bed. She put her arm around me and I eventually cried myself to sleep in her arms.

When I woke up next I heard voices in the background. Whoever it was, they were in the room with me. It was a man and a woman. Whoever they were, they were talking about me. I was too tired to look and see who it was at this point and I wanted to see what they were saying.

"You don't understand do you? She fell asleep crying in my arms." Ok, so I was assuming that the woman was Beth. "Josef, I think she needs to be moved out of the hospital and she needs us to be here with her at all times. She isn't totally there right now. Psychologically, she just can't handle all of the stress. All of the new faces, everyone always trying to get information out of her, she shouldn't have to deal with this right now." I didn't know whether to be insulted by Beth's accusation that I couldn't handle anything right now or relieved. I heard Josef sigh. I could imagine him pacing back and forth in the small confines of the hospital room. I heard him mumble something but I couldn't make out what it was.

I decided that I should probably 'wake up' at this point. I tried to move and felt the strain throughout my body. The groan alerted Beth and Josef to the fact that I was awake. I opened my eyes and looked over to where Beth stood. I smiled at her, slightly embarrassed for the fact that I had broken down so completely earlier. Beth walked over to me and sat down with me again.

"Are you feeling a little bit better?" She spoke softly and I could hear the compassion in her voice. I nodded and she relaxed a little bit. "I am going to go and see what sort of food I can get a hold of for you." She then looked over at Josef and addressed him. "Why don't you stay here, Josef. You guys haven't really had a chance to talk yet." With that she walked out of the room, shutting the door behind her. I looked over at Josef and met his eyes for a moment before looking away.

I didn't know how to talk to him. I didn't know what he wanted to here and I just couldn't stand the wall that had formed between us. I wanted nothing more than to be able to crawl into his arms and know that I was safe, but I couldn't do that now could I? I was surprised when he walked over to the bed and sat down in the chair next to me.

"Riley, I… God I don't know where to start here. First off, I know I said this earlier, but I don't know what I can ever do to make you feel safe, but I will regain your trust. If I had been paying more attention, I don't know what I could have done, but I like to think that I should have been able to do something." I started to say something but he cut me off. "Just let me finish please. I can only imagine how hard all of this is for you. In order to start to regain your trust, you can go home tomorrow. I will pay for your doctors and a few select nurses to take care of you at your apartment."

As he said this I started to cry. I thanked him for the offer. I didn't know how to tell him that I would rather be here in the hospital with all of the chaos and strangers than at my own apartment. I was touched beyond belief at his offer but I just couldn't take it. Maybe I could talk to Beth, and she could find somewhere else for me to stay. Unfortunately Josef seemed to pick up on the reasons behind my tears.

"If you would rather stay here, that's fine." I could sense the confusion in his voice. He couldn't understand why I would possibly want to stay here. With my actions, I had practically refused his offer for help. After everything he had just said, he probably took it as a sign that I wasn't going to be able to forgive him. That was the farthest thing from the truth. He was the last person to blame for everything that had happened. Seeing his reaction, I started to cry even harder. With this, Josef got up and walked out of the room. I watched him as he waited outside of my room for Beth to return. She walked back up to the door and the two of them talked.

When they were done Josef left and Beth came in carrying a tray of food. She set the food down on my bed and handed me a glass of water. Once I had gotten myself under control, I started to pick at the food.

"So, Josef told me that when he offered you home care you burst into tears." I looked over at her and saw that she had a smile on her face. I smiled sheepishly back at her. "Don't worry, I talked to him and we are going to set up a room at Mick's for you to stay at for a little while."

"Thank you Beth. Can you apologize to Josef for me? I think he was a little hurt by my reaction. I didn't mean to hurt him, just the thought of going home, I don't know if I can handle it right now."

"It's already taken care of. I told him that you probably were scared to go home and that you should stay with Mick and me. He actually asked me to apologize to you for over reacting. He went to talk to the doctors and I already called Mick. They should be setting up the room soon and you should be able to leave by tomorrow morning." Beth's phone rang and she stepped out to answer it. I was so happy that I was going to be able to leave. I didn't know what to say to Beth, Mick, or especially Josef. Beth walked back into the room a few minutes later.

"That was Mick on the phone. He wanted to let me know that your room would be ready first thing tomorrow morning and that he would also be coming to stay with you here tonight while Josef finished up the room." We sat in silence for a while. After about an hour, I started to yawn. Beth told me to get some sleep and I lay back down. It didn't take me long to drift into sleep.

I was actually able to sleep the night through and woke up a little after 7:30 the next morning. Mick and Beth were both there when I woke up. Beth brought over the food that she had grabbed for me and I ate while the two of them took care of checking me out. At 9:00, everything was taken care of and I was placed into a wheel chair, ready to leave. I had a cast on my leg, one on my arm and was still covered in other small bandages, but I was the happiest that I had been in a long time. I was going home, or at least as close as I was going to be able to for the time being.

A/N: Wow I was able to get this written much faster than I thought. Hope you like it because I start class again tomorrow and probably won't be able to update again until the end of the week. Leave me reviews and let me know what you think, I thrive on them!!!


	13. Trying to Heal

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended

A/N: Ok, so I know that I have some major apologizing to do! I am sooooo very sorry that it has taken me this long to update! School is starting to slow down seeing as all I really have left are my exams. However as soon as I started to have any time to write I was hit with a very horribly timed case of writers block! Now that I am back, hopefully I will be able to update more often!! I am going to try really hard, but one thing that you can do to help push me along would be to leave me a review.

Chapter 13

It has been almost a week since I left the hospital. Mick and Beth had been absolutely wonderful. I have been at Mick's apartment this whole time and I constantly felt like I was in the way, but they both made me feel comfortable and safe. The first night had been horrible. I would dose in and out of sleep for most of the night. Any sound, no matter how small, would wake me and I would sit up in fear of being taken again. When I did sleep, I relived the beatings and the voice clips that I had been forced to take. Beth stayed with me the whole night, but it didn't help. I was completely terrified. However, as the week passed, the nights began to get better. The dreams haven't stopped but I am at least able to make it through most of the night asleep at this point.

Josef has been here every day. He comes over as soon as he gets up at night and stays at least long enough so see that I am able to get to sleep. I am so grateful for everything he has done. I don't know how I will ever be able to make it all up to him. He insists that I have nothing to make up for, but just the fact that he was there, looking for me, is something that I will have to repay him for. He insists that he should be making things up to me; he blames himself for Charlie taking me. I guess we are at an impasse for now. It will have to be worked out as time goes on. Conversation is still forced when I am with him, but it gets a little easier each time we are around each other. I hope that this will all work itself out as time goes on. I want nothing more than for my life to just go back to the way it was before I saw Josef feeding on that girl. But at the same time, even after having gone through so much, being around Josef and Mick, I feel completely at ease.

Beth and Mick had just left to work on a case. Mick had hired extra security to be here with me while they were both gone. I walked back into my room with a glass of water and curled up, ready to watch movies for the rest of the night. My phone rang beside me as I watched the previews. I picked it up, hit ignore, and went back to watching my movie. My parents had been calling me non stop since I had come home with Mick and Beth. They still blamed Josef and knew that Mick was a good friend of him. I hadn't spoken with either of my parents since yesterday morning when I had hung up on them after screaming at them for over an hour. We hadn't fought that bad in a long time. They refused to accept the fact that I wasn't mad at Josef or that I wasn't pressing charges against anyone for what had happened. My phone buzzed again letting me know that I had a voice mail.

I listened to the voice mail three times. I listened three times to my mother telling me that I needed to do something, that I needed to act. She just wouldn't let it go. I just wanted all of this to be over with and no one would let me move on. The tears started as the movie began. I hadn't even made it as far as the opening credits before I was curled up in a little ball, sobbing. I lay down on the bed and cried for what felt like hours.

Through the tears I heard the door open and someone walk into the room. I didn't even look up as someone sat down next to me and pulled me into their lap. After a few minutes of me continuing to sob into this stranger's chest, I realized that I knew the smell of this stranger's cologne. Josef. I started to cry even harder. It felt good to get all of the tears out, they had refused to come for the past week.

Josef wrapped his arms around me and held my head against his body. I slowly pulled my arms up and wrapped them around Josef's neck. I was surprised when I heard Josef begin to whisper calming nonsense speech to me. It had its desired effect and I could feel myself slowly calming down. My body was shutting down. Josef must have been able to tell that I was shutting down and ready to sleep because he lay me down on the bed and tucked me in. I smiled as I felt him tuck a lose piece of hair behind my ear. He stood there with his hand on my cheek. Eventually he pulled away and walked to the door. I looked over at him as he opened the door.

"Thank you Josef." I whispered to him before he shut the door. I knew that he had heard me and that was enough to allow myself to drift off to sleep.

I woke up the next morning as the sun shown through the curtains in my room. I sat up and took a deep breath. I sat there for what felt like an eternity. After last night, I didn't know what to expect from Josef, but I knew that somehow everything had to get better. Last night was a step forward and things would get easier, they had to. I walked over to the door and pulled on my sweat shirt as I walked out of the room.

I made my way into the kitchen and sat down next to Beth. She looked over at me and smiled while she pushed a cup of coffee towards me. I started to say something but Beth seemed to be faster this morning.

"Riley, Josef talked to us when we got back last night. He and Mick are in Mick's office right now. Are you okay?" I smiled. I should have known that Josef would have told them both all of what had happened.

"Yeah, I think I am. I really need to talk to Josef, before I do anything else today. Is it okay if I go up?"

"Yeah, I don't think they are doing anything that important."

"Thanks Beth. And I promise we will talk later. I just need to do this." I then walked down the hall and over to Mick's office. I knocked on the door and then let myself into the room. I smiled at both of the vampires that were standing in front of me. "Mick, I need to barrow Josef for a little while." Josef said good bye to Mick and we both walked back to my room. I walked over and sat down on my bed. Josef followed me over and stood before me. He reached down and took a hold of both of my hands.

"Riley, I think your time here with Mick and Beth is up. The two of them need to get back to their lives." I was shocked to say the least. Here, I was planning on thanking him for last night and he was kicking me out of someone else's house? I knew that my shock probably showed on my face, but I didn't care.

"I can't leave. I don't have anywhere to go, I can't go home to my apartment and I can't go and stay with my parents right now. Does Mick really want me to leave now? I mean, I've only been out of the hospital for a week. Where am I supposed to go?" I knew that I was babbling but I couldn't seem to shut myself up.

"Riley, calm down. I was thinking instead of you staying here that you could come home with me. I have plenty of extra rooms at my house and that way I wouldn't have to come over here to check on you all of the time." He looked down at me and smiled. I swear any frustration that I might have had towards him melted instantly. He just had that effect on me. I nodded, not trusting myself to form a coherent sentence. He pulled me up and kissed me lightly on the cheek and then left the room.

I stood there in complete shock.

A/N: Okay, so I know that was shorter than most of my chapters and I apologize for it, but I had to get something up to you now that I have managed to get rid of the writers block that has been plaguing me for the past three weeks! Be kind and review and I am going to try really hard to have another chapter up soon and it should be longer than this one!!


	14. New Home At least for now

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended.

A/N: Look I actually updated within a reasonable time frame!! I am please to say that with this chapter, the writers block seems to be gone for the time being, knock on wood!! I am really happy with the way this chapter turned out and hopefully you all agree with me!! Leave me wonderful reviews and let me know what all of you wonderful readers think about the new chapter!! I thrive on your reviews and I have no problems begging!! You all are wonderful!!

Chapter 14

It had been two days since Josef had asked me to move in with him. Since that day, I had very quickly become more and more like my old self as the hours past. I was starting to get some of my old personality back. Beth had even told me that the fight had started to shine in my eyes once again. It felt so good to be back to my normal self. I hadn't realized how badly I had been hurt psychologically until I had finally started to heal. I never wanted to feel like that again.

I had spent the last 24 hours packing and thanking Mick and Beth for their kindness. I didn't know exactly how hard it was going to be to say goodbye to Beth. I knew that I would still be able to see her all of the time, but she had really become almost like a sister to me. Still, nothing could have kept me from accepting Josef's invitation. I still couldn't believe that he had asked me to move in with him. That man found a new and unique way to surprise me every day. Staying with him for the time being would be an interesting experience.

I was now waiting for the car Josef had sent over to arrive. I couldn't believe that I was actually doing this. I was pacing the length of Mick's living room waiting for that fateful buzz of the intercom. This waiting was going to drive me absolutely up the wall. I went into the kitchen to pour myself a drink. I nearly jumped out of my skin when I heard a voice behind me.

"I should be a little insulted here. Is the idea of moving into my house really so daunting that you need to be drunk to do it?" I turned around, slightly shocked that Josef was here. He had that amazing grin spread across his face, one that I had begun to realize normally signified trouble. I had expected a driver to come up and help me with my bags. I had expected to have to wait around inside a strange house waiting for Josef to wake up for most of the day. I most diffidently did not expect Josef to be the one to come and get me. I realized that he was teasing me, expecting me to just lie down and put up with it. He really should know better than that by this point.

"Yes, in fact it is. I was only going to have one, but now I don't know. Since you are the one to come and get me, I may need to have a few more." He looked a little shocked at first, but I knew that he could make out the teasing in my voice. Once I knew he knew I was teasing, I turned back around and poured a drink for myself. I then went to the cupboard and grabbed a glass for him. I poured him a glass and handed it to him with a smile.

"I don't know how I can ever thank you enough for this. It means a lot to me that you would let me come and live with you for however short or long this turns out to be. "I could tell that the thanks had made him slightly uncomfortable, as he was suddenly very focused on his drink. "I won't say anything else about it, if you don't want me to. I just needed to let you know how grateful I was. I'm going to go and grab my last bag from up stairs and then I should be ready to go." I set my glass down and made my way upstairs. I grabbed my small bag and sat down one last time on the bed. This was a big step. No matter how innocent the offer might have been from Josef, this would never be just something that I could over look. I knew that I was attracted to him; I would have to be blind, deaf and dumb to not be. I knew that he most likely didn't feel even the smallest amount of attraction to me, yet I was still so willing to throw myself in with the lions. I had to accept what I was doing.

I reached into my bag and took out a small necklace that I had made for Beth. I walked into her room and set it on her desk in the corner of the room. Everything in my life was changing so fast. I didn't know what to do any more. I was finally at that point where I have to just let go and let everything play out as it will. I walked back downstairs where Josef was waiting for me. My other bags were nowhere to be seen, I was assuming that Josef had already taken them out to his car. He took my last bag from me and we walked out of Mick's apartment. The ride down in the elevator was silent. I didn't know what to say to Josef, I didn't know if I should say anything to him. Before we hit the bottom floor, Josef turned to look at me.

"Riley, you don't have to thank me for anything. We have already been down this road before. I am going to do everything within my power to make up for everything that has happened in your life since you found out what I was. Letting you stay with me is only the smallest of things that I could think of, but I have a strange feeling that you wouldn't accept some of the other ideas that I had. You can stay with me until you are comfortable enough to move back into your own apartment." I started to cut him off but he stopped me again. "I don't mean your old apartment. When you feel up for it, we will start to look for somewhere new for you to live. It will have top of the line security and you will chose when you move in."

"Ok. I know you don't want to hear it, but thank you." I left it at that and we stepped out of the elevator. I was almost to the door when Josef grabbed my wrist and pulled me around to face him. He pushed a stray piece of hair away from my eyes and gave me one of his rare true smiles. He then led me out of the building and we finally made it to his car.

Yet another surprise. Since Josef had shown up at Mick's apartment, I had been expecting one of Josef's drivers to be waiting out here for the two of us to come down. I was happy when I realized that it would just be Josef and I on the way back to his home. His sleek black Honda S2000 was waiting for us just outside of the door. He threw my bag into the trunk and then came around and opened the door for me. He walked around the car and got into the car himself.

The ride back to Josef's house was nice. Neither of us said much, we didn't need to. We had somehow reached an agreement and things were finally good. I hadn't felt this at ease with him since I had walked in on him feeding what felt like an eternity ago. So, yeah, overall things were good.

I was pulled out of my thoughts when Josef tapped my hand. "Riley, we're here." I looked over at him and then looked up at the house in front of me. I guess that house didn't quite cover it. I knew that my mouth was hanging open but I couldn't seem to do anything about it. I heard Josef laugh lightly next to me and I knew he was laughing at me and before I could stop myself I was laughing too.

"I have never seen a house this big. This looks like an office building. It's huge." I let out a short laugh again. Josef looked over at me again, his laughter clear in his eyes. Josef pulled the car up into the garage and one of his servants came out and took all of my bags into the house before I could even get out of the car. I looked up and Josef was standing in front of my with the door open. I took his hand and let him pull me up and out of the car. He showed me into the main house and closed the door behind me.

I knew that my face probably resembled that of a child on Christmas morning. Josef's house was absolutely beautiful. He showed me around the entire downstairs which consisted of the kitchen, guest rooms galore, the weight room and Josef's home office. We went up the stairs and I continued to be in awe of the sheer size of this place. There were multiple guest rooms up here as well for some of Josef's more important guests. There was a beautiful library that connected to one of the large guest rooms.

"This is your room. I know that you like to read, so I figured it would make sense to give you private access to the library. My room is right down the hall, if you ever need me during the day. If you can wait until closer to twilight that would be best, I can be a little temperamental if I am woken up. I really need to get some sleep, is there anything else that you need for right now?" I didn't know what to say at this point. Everything was so perfect at this point. He had put a lot of thought into all of this. I looked over at the clock at was surprised to see that it was already 11:00. I had kept Josef up much later than he was probably used to. The sun was shining brightly and I silently thanked anyone who happened to be listening for having Josef in my life. I didn't know many people, men in particular, who would have done as much for me as Josef had done.

"No, I think I should be okay for a while. After all, I have a whole library waiting for me." I smiled as I said this. Josef just kept on surprising me.

"Okay, well if you need anything for the next few hours, my maid should be down in the room off of the kitchen. There is also a security guard stationed at every entrance to the house. You should be safe here. Go relax." With that he turned and walked back to his room. I made my way to the library.

I walked through the vast shelves. I found one of my favorites and went to curl up in the window seat on the other side of the room. I couldn't imagine a better way to spend the afternoon at this moment.

It was almost 7:00. The afternoon had been wonderful. I had taken a little nap in the middle of the day and had spent most of the afternoon either reading or watching movies. Beth had called a few hours earlier and I had made plans for both her and Mick to come over and join me for drinks and dinner. I was just waiting for Josef to get up at this point. Hopefully he wouldn't mind the fact that I had invited guests over without asking him. I was helping myself to a drink when I heard someone walk into the room behind me.

"Good evening Riley." I turned around and tried to keep the blush off of my cheeks. Josef was standing in front of me in what appeared a robe with nothing underneath.

"Did you sleep well?" Josef looked slightly taken aback but smiled.

"Yes. It was nice to know that I didn't have to worry about anything happening to you when I was asleep."

"Listen, Josef. I hope you don't mind, but I invited Beth over to join me for dinner and Mick is coming along as well. They should be here in about 30 minutes."

"Of course that's fine. I should go get dressed then. I will be back down in about 20 minutes." He turned around and walked back towards the stairs. "Oh and Riley, I saw that blush when I came in. Should I be flattered?" He looked back at me with a teasing smile and walked back up the stairs without waiting for me to answer.

I helped Josef's maid, Anaya, set dinner up once Josef had disappeared. I was running around getting all of the last minutes details taken care of when the door bell rang. I yelled up the stair for Josef and went to open the door. It was funny how quickly I had really started to feel at home here. I liked Josef's home. While Mick's apartment had been fun, I always knew that I would have to leave. Josef's home was someplace that I felt really comfortable, even after only one afternoon. It made it hard to think about when I would have to eventually leave.

I opened the door and let Beth and Mick in. It was so good to see both of them already. They walked in and I got a hug from both Beth and Mick. We spent the next few minutes talking until we were joined by Josef. He and Mick excused them selves and walked over to the balcony, giving Beth and I a chance to talk. The night passed like a dream. I couldn't imagine a better way to spend a day. The whole day had seemed like magic. We said goodbye to Mick and Beth at about 11:00 that night.

I said goodnight to Josef and made my way back to my new room. I changed into pajamas and walked into the library. I picked up Pride and Prejudice, and sat down, hoping to finish it before I went to bed. I was so engrossed in the book that I hadn't noticed that Josef was sitting in the chair next to me. I put the book mark into the book and set it down.

"Pride and Prejudice was probably one of my favorite of Ms. Austen's works when it first came out." I was slightly surprised by this confession from the vampire. I wouldn't have pictured Josef liking the romantic style of Jane Austin.

"I love the detail that she uses. I would have loved to live in this time. Obviously not with all of the strict rules of society, but the dancing would have been wonderful. I love to dance. I haven't been in such a long time." I stopped myself when I realized that I was starting to babble. I looked at Josef and watched as he stood.

I didn't know what to say when he held out his hand. I took his hand as was surprised as he pulled me into his arms. I thought I was in heaven as he started to spin me around in circles, dancing through the room. I didn't know who started the music, but eventually there were the delicate sounds of the piano filling the room.

We danced for what felt like an eternity. For me, it was an eternity in the arms of an angel. I had imagined what it might be like to dance with Josef, but nothing would have been able to prepare me for the breathtaking reality. Eventually, Josef must have picked up on the fact that I was become more and more tired as the music continued to play around us.

Before I knew what was happening, Josef had scooped me up into his arms and carried me to my room. He set me down on the bed but didn't let go of my arms. He leaned in and kissed me on the temple. He then pulled away and walked out of the room. As the door shut I felt my body fall backwards onto the bed, a stupid grin covering my face.

A/N: Ok, again I hope everyone enjoyed this and please remember to leave me a review!! Hopefully I will be able to update soon!


	15. Falling

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended.

A/N: Wow, twice in less than a week. I am on a major role right now!! Anyways, I am glad that everyone seemed to like my last chapter and am hoping you all like this one just as much! Leave me a wonderful review and let me know what you all think!!

Chapter 15

It had been almost a week since we had danced in the library. Josef and I hadn't really been able to spend any time together since them. He has been so busy at work lately that I only saw him for a few minutes between when he got home from the office and when he went to bed. I had taken advantage of the day time to really get to know my way around Josef's home. I had also gotten to know most of the maid's and security that Josef kept here during the day.

However, I still spent most of my time either in the gym or in the library. The window seat in the library had almost become my personal refuge. I could sit there and let my mind wander for as long as I liked. No one disturbed me when I was there. I assumed that Josef had probably warned everyone off from bothering me in there. It was nice to have one place in this huge house that was really all mine.

Beth had been here pretty regularly since I had moved in. She would normally stop over earlier in the morning and we would have a chance to talk before she had to go into work. I think that was the only reason I hadn't gone crazy from being here without any friends. Josef still refused to allow me to go back to work, and part of me hated him for it. I was bored out of my mind without anything to do. I had even started to write, something that I used to hate to do. This was really the only way I could get everything out of my head that needed to be let out. Writing had quickly become another savior to me.

It was nearing twilight and I knew that Josef should be getting up soon. I was hoping that I would get a chance to see him for a little while today. I made my way down to the kitchen in hopes that he might stop by before he left. He normally had to walk straight though here in order to get to his freshies rooms. I smiled as I heard footsteps on the stairs. Josef walked into the room and smiled at me when he saw me sitting at the counter. He started to walk through the room without saying anything but I refused to let him get away that easily.

"Is there a reason that you seem to be avoiding me?" He stopped dead in his tracks and turned around to face me. I knew that he was surprised even before I saw his face.

"What are you talking about Riley? Why would I possibly be avoiding you?"

"I know that you have been busy at work, but I was hoping that even though you were busy, you might still make time to at least talk to me. We haven't really had a chance to talk since my first night here." I watched his face for anything that would give away his emotions. Like always, his face wouldn't betray his heart. I needed something here. I knew that he was watching me as well. The corners of his mouth slowly raised into a small grin.

"Riley, if you wanted to see me, all you had to do was say so. What about tonight? I will call into work, you make plans for us. I have to go eat and shower. I should be ready in about 30 minutes. I will see you then." With that he walked out of the room.

Okay really, that was much easier than I had expected.

I was in the library, waiting for Josef to finish getting ready when I heard a knock at the door. I turned around and was once again stopped by how amazing he could look with such minimal effort. He was dressed in a pair of jeans with a black silk shirt that hugged every muscle of his chest perfectly.

"So are you just going to continue to stare at me, or are we actually going out tonight?" Shit, so there goes being subtle.

"Um, yeah we are going out. But first, I do believe we have dinner waiting for us downstairs." He laughed a little and then walked over to me. He offered his arm and then escorted me out of the library and down the stairs. We had made it to the bottom of the stairs and were about to walk into the dining room when he pulled me back towards him.

"By the way, you look beautiful." He gave me one of those smiles that make you feel lucky to be alive and then continued to lead me into the next room. He walked me over to the table and pulled out my chair for me. Always a perfect gentleman. He then walked over to the other side of the table and sat down. Soon after a maid walked in with a glass of blood for Josef and a glass of white wine for me. I was surprised at the amount of things we actually had in common. We were able to talk for what seemed like forever.

I was also surprised at how willing Josef seemed to be about his human life. He told me about his family and how they had been killed by the vampire that had eventually changed him. How he had stayed with his sire until he fell in love with a vampire some 100 years later. He then went on to explain his connection to Coraline and how she had introduced him and Mick. In turn, I told him about growing up with my family. I told him about how I had spent most of my elementary school years living with an aunt and uncle who were emotionally abusive.

"I knew as soon as I turned 18 I was going to move out. I knew that was going to happen as soon as I came back to live with my parents at the start of middle school. I left the day I turned 18. I rented an apartment and left. It wasn't that I was mad at them, but I just couldn't live under someone else's rules. They called me at least once a week after I moved out but I never really felt that close connection with them. My brother and I still talk and get lunch every few weeks, but that is about as close as I get. They always call me around Christmas and peoples birthdays to see if I will come back and visit. Most of the time I don't go, some times I go back to visit, but most of the time I keep my distance. It has always been too hard. I just ran one day and never wanted to turn back. Actually, when they came to see me in the hospital that was the first time I had seen them in almost a year." I stopped at that point. There was no reason to fill him in on the fact that if his company hadn't started to pay for my apartment, I would probably be living on the streets. There was no point in telling him now that my parents had cut me out of their will when I had left home. We had gotten to the point where I did trust him, but we just started to talk like more friends rather than boss and employee, I didn't want to screw that up with dumping anything to personal on him. We had finished with dinner and Josef had walked over to my side of the table to help me up again.

"So, Riley, what exactly do you have planned for us next?" He looked down at me and I was glad that I hadn't given him any more information. I could already see the beginnings of pity forming in his beautiful brown eyes. Part of me was glad that I had told him what I had, but the other part couldn't bear to see him look at me with the pity so clearly there. But for tonight I was going to push that aside, tonight we were just going to have fun.

"I hope you know how to dance, Josef." I winked at him and walked over to the front door. I grabbed my jacket off of the couch and waited for him to meet me. His eyes met mine and the pity that I had seen just a minute before was no longer there. Now his eyes met mine in a clear acceptance of the challenge that I had just laid before him. He took my hand and kissed the back of it before pulling me out to his car and setting off.

The club was packed with people in their young twenties. We danced for what felt like forever. It felt so good to be back in his arms after the last week. I couldn't help but be jealous of every glance made in his direction. Every girl there wanted to be with him and quite a few tried to make it happen. My jealousy couldn't ruin the night though. I was so happy. I was even happier the few times that Josef had to keep other men away; I thought I saw a spark of jealousy in his eyes as well, and that thought made my heart soar. I knew that I was getting myself in way to deep, but I couldn't help myself. As we danced through the night, I was just happy that I was with him for the time being.

The night ended eventually and Josef drove me home. He had to carry my to my room when we got back, I was exhausted and my feet hurt like hell. He lay me down in my bed, so much like last week, and we said our goodnights. He left and I fell asleep more confused than I had been in a long time.

I woke up the next morning, still just as confused as I was last night. I didn't know what to do any more. I needed to talk to Beth today. I walked to my bathroom, took a quick shower, and got dressed. I called Beth as I was eating breakfast and asked her to come over. She was here within an hour.

I let her in and we went upstairs to sit in the library as we so often do. We sat down and I tried to think of the best way to start. This was going to be impossible to admit to because I knew how stupid it was.

"Riley, tell me what is going on. I know something isn't right, so spill." She smiled at me and I forced myself to start talking.

"Beth, I need you to just let me talk. Let me get everything out and then you can tell me what you think, ok?" I waited for her nod before I continued. "Josef and I went out clubbing last night. We went out and danced for hours. I feel safe with him. He is one of the few people that I feel like I can really trust. I knew a few weeks ago that I was starting to develop a little crush. I was hoping that it was just a crush and would stay there. But after living here with him for a week and after last week and last night, Beth I don't think this is just a little crush anymore. I think I really care for Josef." It had been just as hard as I had thought to actually say this out loud. Yes I was attracted to him, but I knew that I would most likely get hurt if I let this go any farther. But at the same time, I didn't want this to stop. I could tell that Beth was a little surprised but she hid it pretty well.

"Riley, I understand where this is coming from, really I do. And I have to say that watching Josef interact with you, I think he might care for you too. But I know a lot of what he has been through, and I don't know if he is good for you Riley. I know that this isn't what you want to hear, but I don't want you to get hurt. I accept who Josef is. He is a great friend to Mick, and as such we have gotten close. But I also know that Josef tends to be a bit of a, oh how do I say this nicely, man whore." I couldn't help myself; I had to laugh a little at that. "You need to really think about what you are doing if you really want to get involved with him."

We continued to talk for another few hours. Some of the conversation strayed back to Josef but we talked about a lot of other things as well. Beth had given me a lot to think about. But the main thing that drew my attention was the fact that even knowing all of what Beth had told me along with what Josef had told me the night before, I was still waiting for him to get up so that I could see him later tonight. No matter what everyone was telling me, I had fallen already, and hard.

A/N: okay, so that is another chapter. Hope you all enjoyed it and I am now begging you to leave me super nice reviews!!


	16. Kiss

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended.

Chapter 16

-Josef's POV-

I pulled myself out of my freezer close to twilight. I couldn't make out Riley's heartbeat anywhere in the house. That was probably better at this point. Our 'date' last night was amazing. The past week really had been closes to hell. I hadn't realized how hard it was going to be to keep away from her after I had held her in my arms. Being able to hold her all night last night was amazing.

This whole thing was getting way out of hand. I had to figure out a way to get over this. I could not let myself fall for another human. This could simply not be allowed. I could not have a repeat of Sarah, it wasn't possible. If it came down to being happy with Riley or cutting her out of my life, well, I didn't want to have to make that decision. Shower, I need a shower.

I walked into the bathroom and turned on the water. I pulled off my robe and stepped into the water, attempting to clear my mind for at least a few minutes. When I stepped back out of the shower and pulled my towel around my waist, my mind was still far too busy. I walked back into my room and pulled on a pair of boxers. I then made my way down the stairs to get some breakfast.

I walked past the kitchen and let myself into the set of rooms that I had set aside for my freshies. I walked in and sat down in one of the chairs in the front room. I looked up and smiled as Carrie walked over to me. She was one of the best AB negatives that I had living here with me. She held her wrist out to me and I pulled her into my lap. I pulled her wrist towards my mouth. I kissed her wrist lightly before my fangs slipped softly into her sweet skin. I lost myself in the rich taste of her blood. My mind was finally able to get away from Riley and I found myself actually able to relax.

By the time I made it to work, I was in a slightly better mood. I had been able to push Riley out of the front of my mind and was now focusing completely on work. Oh, hell who was I kidding? I am constantly thinking about her. It is all that I can do to not run home and wake her up right now. I have got to do something about this. I was about as happy as I could be when I saw the door open and Mick walk in. Finally someone that I might be able to get some feed back from.

"Mick, what a surprise to see you here tonight." He gave me a weird look. Ok, so I wasn't necessarily being subtle about this.

"What exactly is it that you need, Josef?" I could tell from the look on his face that he already knew where I was going with this. He was going to milk this for all that it was worth. The smirk on his face said it all.

"You're an ass, I hope you know that. It's about Riley. I can't fall for another human, Mick. I just can't do it. If I fall in love with her, either I am going to have to leave her, or she is going to ask me to change her. And I know that right now, it shouldn't even matter because I don't love her. Yes I am attracted to her, but I just don't know what to do if things go any farther than this. I would have to leave her, because I cannot take the risk of changing another girl. Especially if it's Riley."

"Josef, this is as serious as I have seen you about anyone in a long time. I never saw you when you were with Sarah, but I saw the way you looked at her when we were in New York. You had just the same amount of love and concern in your eyes when we finally found Riley. I know you probably wanted me to talk you out of this, but I can't do that. You just need to wait and see where this goes. Don't push her away right not. You don't know how she feels yet, do just wait and see what she does." Damn him. He is right, I wanted him to talk me out of this, but at the same time I was hoping he would tell me exactly what he did.

It had been a really long day. Mick left soon after we finished talking. I finished up my work and left early. I got home at about 9:00. I looked around to see if I could find Riley. She wasn't anywhere to be seen on the first floor. I grabbed some breakfast for Riley and grabbed myself a glass of blood before I made my way up to the library. I walked in and found her already curled up with a cup of coffee.

"Hey, Riley. I got back from work a little early so I figured I would bring you up some breakfast." I couldn't help but smile when she looked up at me.

"What exactly did you bring me?"

"Oh you know the usual, more coffee, eggs, bagel. You think you might be interested in any of it?" she laughed and I couldn't help but smile. I handed her the trey full of food and sat down next to her.

-Riley's POV-

I couldn't believe that he was actually here, spending time with me instead of getting more things done at work. I took the trey of food and picked at it a little bit. I worked on the food for about another hour. The whole time he just sat there with me. He grabbed a book and looked so at ease, so comfortable. We just had so much in common. I didn't know what I should do about all of these feelings.

I got up and walked over to the couch that was in front of the fire place. I curled up in one of the corners and pulled a blanket over me. I had gotten exactly what I wanted when I heard Josef walk up behind me.

"Trying to get away from me now?" I looked up at him and smiled. He leaned down and scooped me up in his arms, receiving a squeal from me. He set me down on the ground and then proceeded to sit down in the spot that my butt had previously been occupying. I glared up at him receiving one of the best things in the world, a smile and a deep laugh. He reached down and pulled me up onto his lap. I curled myself up in his lap and lay my head back on his shoulder. This is where I wanted to stay for as long as I could. And maybe, just maybe, this meant that he wanted me to stay here too. I had to make sure though.

"Josef, I know this is probably not the best time to bring this up because I am sure that you need to get to bed soon, but I was thinking that maybe sometime this week we could go out and start looking for an apartment so that I can get out of your way." He didn't answer right away. We sat in silence for a few minutes and I turned around to look at him. I couldn't be sure, but I thought that I saw a hint of pain in his eyes.

"We can go out any time you want and start looking, but if you are just looking for an apartment now just because you think you are in the way here, you need to know something." He picked me up and turned me around to face him. "You are not in the way here. You are welcome to be here for as long as you want to stay." He looked at me and I could see the tenderness flash in his eyes. "Tell me right now, if you really want to leave and we can make it work. I will find something for you today if you really want to leave."

-Josef's POV-

Riley looked up at me and smiled. She was beautiful when she smiled like that. It was so pure, so perfect.

"Josef, I don't want to go anywhere. I am happy right here with you. I love being here with you. As long as you are going to let me stay, then I will." Oh shit. I had a feeling that she cared about me as much as I cared about her, but I have to say I wasn't totally ready for her to admit them to me right now. I wanted this to work, but I didn't know what to say to her. Wow, that is probably a first. "I'm sorry that I brought all of this up, I just didn't know…"

"Riley, Riley, listen. Don't worry about any of it." I reached out and brushed hair away from her face. I smiled at her and leaned down and finally kissed her. I had wanted this for so long. Her lips were soft under mine and I almost lost complete control as I heard her moan softly under me. It was her turn to receive a moan from me as she pulled away from me.

"You need to get some sleep and I'm not going anywhere. I will be here when you wake up and we might be able to pick up where we left off." She winked at me and then stood up and walked over to her bed room. I wanted to follow her, but I knew that I needed to just do as she said and get some sleep. I think I am going to have to take a cold shower first though.

A/N: Okay, I know that this is short. I wanted to get this chapter up though so it is a little bit shorter than the rest of them. I hope that I will get another chapter up soon!! Leave a wonderful review for me to get next time I get on!!


	17. Confession

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended.

Chapter 17

It had been two days since Josef had finally kissed me. I still hadn't totally figured out what had happened that night. The past 48 hours had been heaven. Any moment that we were both awake and at home we spent in each others arms, watching movies, reading, sitting. I was in love, it was plain and simple. I didn't know if he felt the same way, but for now, I was happy. He was sleeping at the moment. I was curled up in the window seat in the library. I was startled out of my book when there was a knock at the door.

"Beth, what are you doing here?" I was shocked but happy to see her. She laughed a little and walked over to join me.

"Mick needed to talk to Josef. He decided that since it was so close to twilight he could risk waking Josef up. I still don't think it was the best choice, but you know there is no talking sense to either of them. So, how have things been with Josef the past few days?"

"Oh things have been wonderful. This was exactly what I could have hoped for. I know that he cares, that's all I could ask for right now. I love him, I don't know if he feels the same way, but for right now, that's okay. I am just happy to be able to spend this time with him." I smiled and Beth returned my smile happily. "Let's go grab some coffee and wait for the boys down stairs." We walked down stairs and sat on the couch in the living room waiting for Mick and Josef to join us.

-Josef's POV-

I woke up to Mick banging on the door of my freezer. Oh, this is going to be one hell of a day. I pushed the door open and glared at Mick.

"What the hell do you want, St. John?" Seriously, would another hour have been too much to ask.

"I need Ryder to track someone down for me." I swear to god, he woke me up for work. I really am going to kill him. "I also wanted to talk to you about Riley."

"Fine, I'm up. Let me go put some clothes on and I will meet you in my office." I pulled myself out of the freezer and walked into my other room. I walked pulled on a pair of boxers and walked down the hall to my office. I walked in and shut the door behind me. Mick was already sitting down waiting for me.

"Mick, this case had better be important for you to have come over here to wake me up." I couldn't seem to help the slight growl in my voice and it caused Mick to laugh.

"There is a girl that went missing two days ago. I just need Ryder to trace something for me and then I was hoping that you might help me go get her once we have found her. But that isn't the main reason that I came here. I haven't talked to you the past few days but I have heard things from Beth. What is going on with you and Riley?"

"Well you just skip all of the preliminaries don't you? After we talked, I was able to get some work done, but I ended up coming home early. We spent some time together that morning and she basically told me how she felt. I kissed her. It was the best feeling in the world. I haven't felt this comfortable with someone, this at ease, since Sarah. Just being in the same room with her, even after just two days, she brightens everything up. She shines. Mick, even though I told you two days ago that it wasn't at this point yet, I think I have been in love with her since we rescued her. I love her." Even though I had known this for a few days now, it was still hard to say this out loud. I knew this is what I needed right now, but I didn't know how I could tell Riley. I didn't want to scare her off; I didn't want to hurt her. I had too much to think about this evening.

"Well, ok. Let's head downstairs. I have a feeling that the girls are probably waiting for us." This is why Mick was one of my only true friends. He just sort of went with the flow, most of the time that is. He was the only person that I could have told this to and known ahead of time that they weren't going to blow it out of proportion. I also knew that he would keep his mouth shut until I had figured out exactly how I wanted to tell Riley.

I laughed a little at him and we walked out of the office. We walked down the stairs and I couldn't have been happier to see Riley sitting on the couch with Beth. She looked over at me and I thought that the whole world had just lightened immensely. Mick walked over to Beth and kissed her lightly on the cheek. I walked over and joined them. I sat down on the couch and pulled Riley into my lap. She turned to look at me and gave me a small grin. I pulled her face towards mine and kissed her on her forehead. She then turned around and laid her head back against my shoulder.

"I see you two took no time in getting comfortable." I glared at Beth, which just caused her to laugh. Oh yeah, real comforting to know that I don't scare her at all any more. Riley also started to laugh when she saw the look that I was giving Beth.

"What can I say, he has a comfortable lap." I could tell by her tone of voice that she was smirking as she said this and that was only confirmed when I looked over at Mick. He was trying to damn hard not to laugh.

"You okay over there, Josef?" I was going to kill Mick, plain and simple, I was going to kill him. I leaned forward and kissed Riley again on the cheek.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Why, Mick?"

"Oh no reason. It's just, I could have sworn that after Beth said something there was a bit of a blush there." He couldn't even say it with a straight face.

"You don't know what you're talking about." Beth and Mick both let it drop after that. Riley turned around and kissed me. I could tell that by the look in her eyes this was not dropped by everyone. I was going to here about this later and I have a feeling that was Mick's reason for doing this.

I called into work, letting them know that I was taking the night off. I watched Riley closely for the rest of the afternoon. Part of me was waiting for her to bring up our earlier conversation. She seemed so comfortable here. She and Beth seem to really become fast friends, but that wasn't surprising, that was just who Beth was, and I didn't know anyone that could really say no to Riley, I know I can't. But what did surprise me was that Riley was still so comfortable with Mick and me, even after all that had happened. I watched her all afternoon and I never saw one bit of fear or uncertainty in her eyes. Seeing all of this, I could help but fall a little bit farther in love with her.

At around midnight, Mick and I could tell that the girls were starting to fade. Mick and Beth left and Riley and went up to the library. We sat in front of the fire for close to two hours before I realized that she was asleep. I carried her into her room and pulled her blanket up over her arms. I walked back into the library and sat down at the piano. I put my fingers to the keys and play.

It had been such a long time since I had even thought about sitting down to play. The music flowed so easily, it was as if I had never stopped. All thoughts of anything except for Riley and the music stopped. She was the only reason the music flowed. She was the reason I chose to sit down again and play. I was so thoroughly consumed by the music that I didn't notice anyone come into the room. I didn't know she was there until she put her hand on my shoulder. Slightly startled, I turned around to face her.

"Ri, what are you doing up? I thought you were asleep."

"I heard the piano. I got up to see where it was coming from. I didn't know you played. It sounded amazing." The look in her eyes was so soft, so gentle. I could make out slight traces of fatigue around the edges of her eyes but mostly she just looked content.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to wake you up. You should go back to sleep, you've had a long night."

"I'm fine, really. And don't apologize for waking me up. It was nice to be able to hear the music. When I was younger, my grandfather used to play. He died when I was really little, and I haven't heard any one playing in such a long time. I've missed it."

"Go lay down on the couch, over by the fire. I will play a little bit more for you if you try to get some sleep." She stuck her tongue out at me and laughed quietly.

"Yes, dad." She leaned down to kiss me and I pulled her closer to me, not wanting to lose the contact of her lips on mine. She pulled away and walked over to the couch. She grabbed a blanket and curled up into a ball on the couch. I continued to play until I heard her heart beat slow down. I walked over to her room and turned on a recording that I had originally made for Sarah almost 50 years ago. I put it into the CD player that I had put in her room and turned it on. I walked back into the library and picked Riley up once again and carried her back to her room. She woke up as I lay her down, pouting up at me.

"I thought I told you I wanted to listen to you play longer. You're no fun." I couldn't help but laugh at her.

"Riley, you keep falling asleep. Anyways, listen to what is playing. It's a CD I made a long time ago of me playing. Now, go back to sleep."

"Stay with me. At least until I fall back asleep." I really had no strength to say no to her. I wasn't going to be able to get any work done tonight.

"You're just trying to be stubborn aren't you? Just let me go grab a few things. I will be right back, try and get to sleep." I went and grabbed a few things that I could work on in her room and went back in. She was starting to dose off when I came back in, but sat up when I sat down with her. She leaned over and kissed me when I sat next to her. I put my hand on the small of her back and pulled her a little bit closer to me.

I didn't know if this was the right time to do this or not, but this was the only thing that was going through my head at the moment. I pulled away slowly from her. I looked her in the eye and could see the trust there. I only hoped this didn't screw anything up.

"Riley, There is something I have to tell you." I leaned forward and gave her a quick kiss on her forehead. I looked her in the eyes and held on to her as tight as I could without hurting her. "Riley, I love you."

A/N: Okay, I know this is still shorter than where I was. I am going to try to get them back up a little higher, but I had to stop this one where I did! Hope you all like it and I will try to update again soon!


	18. Jealousy

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended.

Chapter 18

He looked me in the eyes and I couldn't be happier than I was at this moment, just being able to sit here with him. He pulled me tight against him.

"Riley, I love you." Time froze as he spoke. I couldn't breathe, I was too afraid that if I moved in any way I would wake up and none of this was going to be real. He pulled back from me a little, just enough to look into my eyes. I could see the fragility and sincerity pouring into my own eyes from his. I felt a small tear slide down my cheek.

"I love you too Josef." The fear and uncertainty disappeared and I was rewarded with a smile that lit up his entire face. I reached my hand up to his face and pulled him towards me. I pulled him close enough so our foreheads were touching and I had wrapped my hands back around his neck. He gave me a light kiss and pulled back away from me. He stood up and he laughed just slightly at the pouting expression that I was sure had taken over my entire face. He pulled his shirt off and the proceeded to lay down in bead with me. I was pulled me even closer to him; my back was pushed completely up against his chest.

"I'm not going anywhere, Ry." He kissed me lightly on the cheek and I relaxed into his arms. Within moments, I was asleep in Josef's arms and I couldn't have been happier.

I woke up the next morning smiling for the first time in a long while. Last night had been the first night in weeks that I hadn't been plagued by nightmares. I rolled over, expecting to bump into Josef at some point and was surprised when I didn't find him lying next to me. I sat up and looked around the room. The sun was peaking through the curtains and I looked over to the clock. 8:00 was much earlier than I had planned on waking up, but I guess I couldn't do anything about that now. Who knows, maybe if I actually got my ass out of bed I would get to see Josef before he either went to either the office or his freezer.

I made my way down to the kitchen and the scent of coffee surrounded me. I walked over to the fresh pot and poured myself a glass. I grabbed a granola bar and continued on my search for Josef. I had covered most of the first floor in about 5 minutes and was about to make my way upstairs when I caught site of that beautiful blonde hair. I went to push open the door but stopped when I saw that he was with someone.

No matter how much I wanted to I couldn't pull my eyes away from him. He pulled the girl that was with him closer, until she was flat against his chest. He slowly kissed her neck and I continued to watch with morbid curiosity. I couldn't believe that this was happening, yet I couldn't seem to do anything to stop it. "You taste far to tempting, my dear." I heard him whisper to the petite brunet that stood with him. I couldn't stop the tear from slipping out of my eye and watched as Josef pulled away a little, to let his fangs grow.

I was about ready to slap myself. I couldn't believe I was stupid enough to think that Josef was really cheating on me. This girl was obviously one of his donors, his freshies. I turned away as I saw his fangs slide so seamlessly into the girl's skin. I walked back out to the front room to wait for him. I sat down with my coffee and tried to calm myself down. He was turning me into the jealous girlfriend. I didn't really know if that was a good thing or not, but it was who I was becoming.

I had finally convinced myself to relax when he walked into the room with that damned girl. I really had to find a way to keep my thoughts under control. Josef saw me sitting on the couch and walked over towards me, leaving the other girl glaring at me.

"Morning, love. Did you sleep okay?" He pulled me up so that I was standing with him and gave me a small peck on the tip of my nose. Okay, I really had no will power when it came to him. There was really no way that I could stay mad at him. I was about to answer when the girl started tapping her foot. I was going to kill her, I really was. She was pissing me off way to much this early in the morning. Josef turned around to look at her, seeing how upset she was at being momentarily forgotten, he started to walk back over to her, hopefully to show her out. Yeah, I wasn't giving up that easily. I grabbed a hold of his hand and walked over with him. He glanced at me and I could tell that he wasn't totally sure what was going on.

"Sorry about that, Alexia. Let me walk you to the door." He smiled at her and I almost felt sorry for how clueless he seemed to be at this point. She reached down and took a hold of his other hand and smiled at me. It was fake and showed exactly how much she didn't like any new girl around Josef. It was amusing when I realized that she thought I was a new freshie.

"Listen, Hun, you don't mind if Josef walked me to the door alone do you?" I swear I wanted to smack that stupid smirk off her face. I took all of my control to keep from doing just that.

"No, Hun, that's fine with me." I pulled Josef toward me and pulled him into a deep kiss. He wrapped his free arm around my waist and eventually I felt his previously occupied hand take hold of some of my hair. I almost forgot that I was doing this all to make that poor girl jealous, well almost all for that reason. I pulled back and smiled at Josef and the look of lust that flashed through his eyes. "We'll talk when you have shown Alexia out, love." I knew that my anger flashed through my eyes when I said her name. I also knew that Josef saw it. I took a few steps back, keeping my eyes locked on him the entire time. There was a slight look of confusion in his eyes, but he forced it away in moments. He gave me a slight nod and I turned away and walked back into the kitchen.

Josef joined me only a moment later. I knew that he was confused about my behavior and I also knew that there was little I could do to stop myself from being jealous of every single one of those girls that he give attention to. I pulled myself up and sat on the counter as he stood there staring at me. We stayed like that for a while. I could admit the obvious to myself, but I wasn't really willing to admit it to him yet. I didn't want to tell him that I hated him giving any other girl any bit of attention. I mean really, I didn't need this issue right now. However, I also knew that he wasn't going to stay silent like this for long.

"Riley, what is going on? What was that show out there for?" Yep. Right on cue.

"It's nothing." Yep, I guess I figured if I could keep my mouth shut as much as possible, maybe it would make the fact that I was getting jealous over something that we couldn't avoid seem a little less crazy. It was going to be nothing but short 2 or 3 word sentences from here on out.

"You know I don't believe you at all, right?" I nodded. Wow, it might be easier than I thought to keep my mouth shut. "Ry, I need you to talk to me love." As he said this he walked over to where I was sitting on the counter. He put his hands on either side of me and just stood there.

"I wanted a kiss." I said this with a smirk and I knew that he wasn't going to let it go. This was going to be one long ass night.

"Ry, if you wanted a kiss all you had to do was ask. We could be up in your room kissing right now. However, I don't think that was all." He leaned down and gave me a small kiss on the corner of my mouth. "What's going on love?"

"She started it." Well there goes that plan. Josef looked at me, one eye brow raised slightly. "Okay, fine. So I might have possibly seen you feeding off of her when I went to look for you this morning. And I guess I didn't like seeing you with her. And then there is the fact that she treated me like I was just some girl off the street that you picked up when you were walking her to the door." When I looked back at him I almost smacked him. "You really think this is amusing, do you?"

"I'm sorry, Riley. I just didn't know you were the jealous type, that's all." He still had a little smirk playing at the corners of his mouth.

"I'm not normally. However, you seem to bring out that side in me. I don't want to share you. I know its stupid and I know you have to eat, but I still don't like it. I don't like that they think they have a chance. I trust you, that isn't the problem. I just don't trust them around you." I hadn't looked at Josef through most of my little speech, and I was afraid to now. I didn't like this side of me, but I loved Josef to much. The thought of having to share him with any one hurt me.

"Well, I have to say I am slightly flattered. There is something you need to here though." He took my hand as we walked back upstairs and sat down on our spot in the library, in front of the fire. "Riley, I have only been in love one other time. I thought that she was the one for me. I tried to turn her eventually and it didn't work. I lost her. I didn't think I would ever find someone that could make me feel like this again. I mean what I said last night. You're it for me. I don't know what I would do if I lost you. I would never do anything to screw that up." He held my eyes the entire time he spoke. I could see every emotion that he was experiencing through his eyes as he spoke. "If it makes you more comfortable, I will build a back house, and I can feed out there, that way you never have to see it. If I need to eat when I'm around you, I will make due with the bagged stuff. If this will make you more comfortable then I will do it." I realized exactly how much I loved him when I saw the look of pure adoration in his eyes. I couldn't really rely on being able to speak at this point, so I nodded in response to his question. "Then it's done. There was something else I had been planning on asking you this morning as well. I know that we were originally just using this as an arrangement until we got you a new place to live, but I don't know if I want to lose this. I like having you here. I like being with you all of the time. I want you to move in with me, Ry."

I knew that I had a somewhat shocked smile on my face. I knew that last night had changed everything, but I didn't think he was going to ask me to make this so permanent so quickly. But at the same time, this is what I wanted, what I needed. I put my arms around him and just sat there in his lap. He put his arms around my waist and held me closer than I though possible. I loved him so much I never wanted to let go.

A/N: Okay, sorry this took a little longer than normal. I meant to have this up last week and just ran out of time to proof it. So hope you all like it, leave me reviews and let me know what you think! I thrive off of your feedback! I am finishing up with my semester at school so I hope to have a little bit more time to update in the next few weeks!


	19. Bliss

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize

Disclaimer: I do not own Josef, Mick or anyone else that you may recognize. Riley and all of the others that come out of my head are of course mine. No copy write infringement is intended.

Chapter 19

Bliss. That was the only thing that could describe how I had been feeling the past month. Josef really did make me happier that I thought I could ever be. He had finally allowed me to go back to work about a week after I moved in with him. He figured out that to much free time on my hands probably wasn't a wonderful idea – I had to much time to make changes to his house and I had access to too much money for them to be small changes. I was happy to be back with him, doing something semi productive.

Beth and I spent a lot of time with each other when I wasn't at work or with Josef. She had cut her hours back at Buzz Wire and was only working two or three days a week. She was the closest thing I had at this point to family. It had been hard for me to push my family away the way that I had. Beth had been there, she knew why I had chosen to do this. I couldn't stay living in my world, knowing what I did about the night that always surrounded us. I didn't know how long I would be human. Even with all of the pain that I had gone through when I was first told about this world, I knew that this is where I wanted to be. I didn't know if Josef would agree to turn me or not, but I would be able to find someone.

Mick was the big brother that Adian had never really been able to be. I was so glad to have him in my life. He took care of me, and for that I would always be grateful. I pulled myself out of my thoughts and out of the chair in front of the library fire that had become mine. I walked out to the balcony that gave you the feeling of being on top of the world. I walked to the railing and closed my eyes. I felt the light breeze whip my hair around my face. I took a deep breath of the moist air. There was a storm on the way.

I stood there for another hour before I felt the first drops of rain falling from the sky. The first sound of rolling thunder brought a harder rain fall. Moments later I felt Josef's arms around me. He didn't say anything; words weren't needed at this point. My life was finally making sense and for the first time, I wasn't running from it. He was the only person that would ever be able to give me that. For now, I was happy and Josef had given me this feeling. This was all I needed.

-Fin-

A/N: Okay, I know that this took much longer than it should have. This is the end of this story, but I do have more ideas. Part of the reason that this took so long was because I couldn't decide whether I should put my other ideas into just this story or make it into two stories. I have decided to split it up and I will try and start that story soon. I am in the middle of a condensed 6 – week semester and that is taking up a lot of my time. Thank you all for sticking with me through all of this and I hope that you will stick around for the next adventure. Please leave me one last review, they truly make my day! Thank you again - Lucky


	20. Authors Note Please Read!

I just wanted to quickly let my readers know that I have finally posted the prologue and the first chapter to my sequel for this story! It is called Stretching Limits and continues with Josef and Riley. I know that it has taken me a LONG time to finally get this posted but I hope that my readers from Breaking the Rules will still be there and will read this next story!


End file.
